


Masquerade

by ScarletRaven1001



Category: Todomomo - Fandom, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Drama & Romance, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, I Will Go Down With This Ship, Marriage Proposal, Marriage of Convenience, Mutual Pining, Quirk Marriages (My Hero Academia), Romance, Romantic Fluff, Side Ship Kacchako, Side Ship Kamijirou, Todomomo is love, Todoroki Shouto is Bad at Feelings, todomomo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:09:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 26,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24909709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScarletRaven1001/pseuds/ScarletRaven1001
Summary: Quirk marriage: a taboo, in the eyes of modern pro-heroes. When Momo gets asked to enter into such an arrangement by none other than Todoroki Shouto, she is understandably stunned, but what surprises her even more is the fact that she found herself saying "yes".Being in a marriage of convenience with the man that she has secretly loved for years is not easy, and it all becomes even harder when he keeps doing things that keep Momo hoping for much, much more.Written for the TodoMomo Mini Bang 2020. Art by Zinmarie1.
Relationships: Todoroki Shouto & Yaoyorozu Momo, Todoroki Shouto/Yaoyorozu Momo
Comments: 85
Kudos: 368
Collections: TodoMomo Collection, TodoMomo Mini Bang 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I am so, so excited to finally share this fic with you! I hope that you enjoy reading this story as much as I enjoyed writing it!  
> My deepest gratitude to all of the moderators of the TodoMomo Mini Bang 2020, for working so hard and giving us this successful fan event! Also, to all those who are participating, you are all wonderful people and I am glad to be a part of this fan community!  
> Many thanks too, to my ever-patient beta, Bitchytimemachine!  
> And of course, endless thanks to my awesome artist partner Zinmarie, who has worked on not just one, but THREE art pieces for this collab! Each image will be shared with their corresponding chapters. Thank you so much for going so extra for this project Zin; you have inspired me, and it is truly an honor and a delight to work with you!  
> As this fic is complete, the updates will be posted four days apart: Chapter 2 on June 29, Chapter 3 on July 3, and the epilogue on July 7.  
> With all that said, let’s get on with the fic! If you have some time, please leave a comment; your words will make my heart very happy. :)

The stars sparkled differently that night.

Yaoyorozu Momo squinted quietly up at the twinkling lights that she could see from her open balcony door. Her fists clenched into the material of her nightdress as she uneasily sat up, swallowed up by the sheets of her king-sized bed; willing the stars to speak to her.

Usually a source of warmth and comfort for Momo, the stars somehow looked bleak and heavy tonight. Of course, they were probably exactly the same as they had always been: she was probably the only one to think that something was different. However, Momo can’t quite shake the feeling that something was odd about them right then.

That they were somehow more restless; mocking.

Sighing heavily, she stood up to close the large doors, before letting the curtains down to shield her from the taunting sparkles. Perhaps, she was being superstitious. However, she couldn’t quite shake the feeling that the stars were trying to warn her of changes that would soon come to pass.

While she normally welcomed challenges, Momo had the eeriest feeling that she wasn’t quite ready for whatever was coming.

8-8-8-8-8

The day started out typically enough: She woke up, got her usual serving of breakfast, before she headed off to work. By the time Momo walked through her office doors, she had all but forgotten about the seemingly strange way that the stars had shined down at her the night before. She may have just been paranoid, after all – the day ahead of her would be perfectly fine!

It had been four years since she graduated from her high school hero course at the prestigious UA. Since then, she had been working at a powerful hero agency in Nagoya, steadily building a name for herself in the hero world. She had completed high school with top academic marks and quite a hefty reputation, as the many controversial and dangerous incidents that she and her classmates had experienced while still in school had helped them pave strong paths into the pro-hero industry. She had begun as a junior sidekick like almost everyone else, but her agency had seen her potential and begun supporting her as an independent pro hero fairly quickly.

She was on desk duty today, and she wrinkled her nose at the paperwork that she had carelessly let pile up from the patrols that she had completed in the past week. Just as she had sat down to begin diving in to the tedious work ahead, a small alert tone blinked up at her from her phone, and she picked it up to check her notifications.

She began to swipe the notifications away, mindlessly removing them as she booted up her computer to begin her tasks. A new bargain sale alert from her favorite online shopping site, silly news from Tweeter, and more silliness from Reeddit; a bunch of internet noise that she wasn’t really interested in. She didn’t have the time for these silly distractions. She really _should_ fix her phone settings.

She was just about to remove the very last notification when a single word caught her eye, and she narrowly stopped her thumb from swiping it away. It was a trending article from a hero news site, and she hovered her finger above it, hesitating slightly.

_“Shouto…”_ she thought, a silent sigh escaping her lips as her gaze lingered on the name.

Her former classmate, Todoroki Shouto, now widely known as pro-hero Shouto, was the topic of this article.

She normally shied away from hero news as she had come to learn that they were usually just full of gossip and speculations about the lives of pro-heroes. Yet, seeing Todoroki’s name on _anything_ always made her curious, and against her better judgment, she clicked on the alert, wincing as her browser opened up the article.

It was a news report of an incident in Kasugai – a city just outside of Nagoya – detailing the events of how the hero Shouto had single-handedly captured the suspects of what looked to be a large-scale robbery. She was rather surprised, as she knew that Todoroki wasn’t supposed to be nearby. He was working at his father’s agency, in Tokyo, hundreds of kilometers away.

Her eyes quickly scanned the report, finding a photo of the hero in question, who wasn’t even in his hero attire as he subdued the perpetrators. Apparently, he wasn’t even on duty; he was just passing by and happened to find the crime in progress, and he decided to step in.

“As expected of Todoroki-san,” she whispered fondly to herself, a smile flitting across her lips as she muttered a line that she had always spoken about him, since they were teens struggling to get through their grueling lessons in school. He had always been responsible, _competent._ She had always thought of him as someone to aspire to become, in spite of the faults that he insisted he carried; those that only he could see within himself.

She found herself scrolling back up the article to take a second look at the photo. He was in civilian clothing, but she noticed that he was wearing his temperature-controlling wrist guards on both arms. She would not even lie to herself and pretend that she was not disappointed that the rather blurry image was not able to clearly depict the face that she remembered so well… The face that, even after four years apart, was still clear and forever stamped into her memories.

She could still see him in her mind’s eye; that determined glint in his dual colored eyes, the way the wind sometimes played with his hair, disrupting the even parting of the red and white strands.

She would always remember the last time she had been with him, outside the UA gates on the evening after their graduation ceremony. She had known him for three years then; fought alongside him, placed her unyielding trust in him during their battles. She had seen him in various states of sorrow and fury, and even been with him during his silent moments of happiness and triumph.

However, as she stood before him then, his eyes had sparkled more brightly than the stars in the sky, a small smile slipping upon his face as he quietly said her name… it was a smile that she had never seen before, and her heart had leapt into her throat, stopping any words that would have wanted to come out of her mouth.

Her chest had ached as she watched the light in his eyes slowly dim back down into his usual melancholy stare, before he turned around and walked away from her.

If he had been about to tell her something then, she had never found out what it was.

Since then, she had silently watched his successes, how he rose quickly in popularity through his incredible hero work and the effortless PR brought about by his uniquely handsome features.

They had never truly lost touch over the years because, after graduation, Todoroki strangely remained one of those few people who would randomly shoot her a quick text message or even a short email. It always puzzled her, why he still kept their lines of communication open, but she would never complain and she was always far too eager to respond. He would sometimes greet her on her birthday, and a few times had even sent her small boxes of sweets from overseas trips. She was sure that he was just being thoughtful and that he probably did the same for the rest of their class, but she had never spoken of his messages or gifts to anyone, a small selfish part of her wanting to believe that she was the only one that he ever paid such intermittent attention to. Their communication was never constant, but it was _there,_ and that was something she would always cherish for reasons that she refused to rationalize to herself.

If he had been in Kasugai the evening before, that meant he was _very_ close. The thought of sending him a quick text and asking him to meet up crossed her mind, but Momo quickly shot that idea down with a firm shake of her head. He knew she was in Nagoya; if he wanted to see her, he could have let her know he was nearby.

Momo finally closed the article, before putting her phone into a desk drawer and grabbing a pen. She really should get started on her paperwork. There was no point in thinking about Todoroki, even though she was mature enough by now to know that she had always admired him more than any other person that she had ever met.

A small commotion outside her small office stole her attention from her work yet again, and she sighed in frustration at this new distraction, clicking her pen in irritation before glancing up.

The pen slipped from her fingers as she gasped in shock at what greeted her eyes.

“I-impossible,” she muttered, rising from her chair as she slowly processed what she was seeing, unable to tear her gaze away.

From beyond her office door, she watched as the very man that she had been thinking about steadily walked in her direction, his gait deceptively relaxed even as she knew how measured his every step was.

His hair was perfectly parted down the middle into waves of red and white, slightly tousled by the winds from outside their building. The white strands obscured his one silver eye, but she could clearly see how its piercing turquoise pair silently swept over the room from beneath his red bangs. Those mismatched eyes were enchanting, and she knew firsthand that being caught in his stare was overwhelming: nothing that went by escaped his notice.

He looked up, and their gazes met from across the hall. She felt her cheeks heat up, the blood rushing within her ears as she stared into his face that seemed even more beautiful than she remembered. She lowered her gaze for a moment, appreciatively noting how his body had filled out generously over the years since they had last seen each other. His hero costume was in its usual immaculate state, the deep blue attire somehow in harmony with the red and white vest of his temperature-modulating jacket and snow-white combat boots.

Looking at him seemed almost surreal. It nearly seemed as if he had stepped right out of her dreams.

She had thought that, with her seeing him on the news every now and then, she would have been well-prepared to see him again in person. Yet, cliché as it may be, the photos of him on the internet and in magazines did him an absolute disservice, as he was far more incredible to behold in real life.

She should really move, or perhaps at least pick her jaw up off the floor, but every mental faculty seemed to pause as she breathlessly watched him walk closer, until he was standing silently at her doorway.

She felt as if she were trapped in a trance, but Momo forcefully shook herself out of her stupor, feeling a wide smile creep onto her face as she finally found her voice.

“Todoroki-san!” she greeted, narrowly managing to avoid the stutter that she could feel twisting at the edge of her tongue. “It is wonderful to see you again!”

He grinned, a slow, small stretch of his lips that seemed out of place as his eyes stared at her intently. “How are you, Yaoyorozu?”

“F-fine!” she answered, nearly wincing as she finally did stutter slightly in his presence. “I’m doing fine, how are you?”

Behind him, she could see the interns and other sidekicks looking on curiously, the static of their inaudible whispers ringing in her ears. She quickly gestured at him to come in, to which Todoroki simply nodded before walking in and shutting the door behind him.

“Please take a seat,” she said, smiling widely as he sat at one of the chairs surrounding the small round table at the corner of her office. She moved from behind her desk, taking a seat across from him as she kept speaking. “I never thought I would see you here today, this is such a pleasant surprise!”

She straightened in her seat, self-consciously pushing back her thick black bangs before she discretely tugged at the base of her high ponytail. She fought the paranoid urge to peer down and check on her hero costume, knowing perfectly well that the thick bare strip down the middle of her red bodysuit was not inadvertently exposing her.

She peered up at him, mentally berating herself for feeling such giddiness. She had literally been seated beside Todoroki in their high school classrooms for _years_ , and she had never felt as awkward as she did at that very moment.

It was the fact perhaps that in reality, he had been nothing more than a boy for most of those years, that made all the difference. The Todoroki seated in her office before her was very much a man – a very handsome, extremely competent man who was smiling at her in a way that made her heartbeats falter – and though Momo realized that she herself was now just as much of a woman, she was not quite used to looking at him as he was _right_ _now._

His unique eyes quietly bore into her, unmoving as they met her gaze head on. She did her best not to look away, plastering her grin onto her face before she spoke again.

“To what do I owe this visit, Todoroki-san?” she asked, before she gasped, nearly smacking herself as she noted the unacceptable lack of tea or any other nuggets she could offer her guest. She turned around partway, hand on one of the small cabinets behind her, the one where she usually hid her snacks. “Would you like some tea or chocolate?”

He shook his head, and she stared breathlessly as that small, enigmatic grin stayed on his face.

“No thank you,” he said, before he finally looked away from her, subtly peering around her small office. “I see you’ve been doing quite well as a hero. I’m glad.”

“Not as well as you,” she said, feeling another irritating blush darken her cheeks, and she willed herself to _calm down_. “You’re Rank 6 in the Hero Billboard Charts. I watched it on TV. Congratulations again, by the way.”

He nodded, looking back at her. “Thank you. You’re doing great yourself, Number 17. I don’t know if I texted you to congratulate you that time …”

“You did, thank you,” she smiled. “I’m… very proud of you, Todoroki-san.”

He huffed, a small pout taking over his face as he leaned forward to place his arm on the table. “We all know that my ranking is being held up by my popularity ratings only. The Number 7 hero outnumbers me in terms of our case resolution count.”

She chuckled at him as his face darkened in contemplation. “Bakugo has been climbing the ranks rapidly, hasn’t he? He was at 10 just last year.”

“And now he’s at 7, and I’m rather sure that I’ve got my work cut out for me now that he’s been rising in media popularity as well,” he said. “His personal life getting so… exposed… turned out very well for him.”

“A big fight with Ochako-chan, and their very enthusiastic confession and kiss, all caught by a paparazzo,” she shook her head, leaning against the back of her chair. “The tabloids had a field day with that one.”

“Uravity is very well-liked by everyone,” Todoroki commented. “And Bakugo being with her has softened up his image.”

He smirked, and her heart skipped a beat as the uncharacteristically devious expression made him look rougher… _playful_.

“At least,” Todoroki said, “I am sure that neither I nor Bakugo have a shot at beating Midoriya’s Number 3 ranking, and I know how much that irritates _Lord Explosion Murder_.”

She laughed, tickled by the naughty comment. She was happy at how relaxed he seemed; enough to joke around her, which she knew was not common for her very stoic friend.

“Do you remember back in third year,” she began, “when everyone made that bet on who among our class would be in the top 10 hero rankings in the next five years?”

“Of course,” he replied. “I believe the pool is ongoing.”

“Kyouka-chan won last time,” she giggled. “She took me out to lunch with Denki-san to celebrate.”

“Jirou – or, I suppose it is Kaminari now,” he said, leaning back to sit straight. “made smart bets. Iida called it a ‘long-con’.”

“He’s not wrong,” she giggled. “It’s amazing how Kyouka-chan got the rankings exactly right in her bets.”

“Midoriya still has the notebook that contains the list of wagers, and he is guarding it as if it is as precious as his limited-edition All Might memorabilia.”

She laughed again. “No one really expected these make-believe rankings of ours to come true now, did we?”

“Our class had done a lot of unexpected things,” he replied. “In hero rankings, hero news… we even have some of the most unexpected couples, don’t we?”

Momo tilted her head in consideration. Some of their classmates who ended up being in relationships with each other _did_ seem like odd couples to outsiders, but as someone privy to the many secrets shared among the girls of their class over several girls’ nights, she had seen some of those pairings coming. She wasn’t an idiot, after all: Kyouka’s constant whining about Denki, Mina’s fascination with Kirishima’s strength, and Ochako’s determination to match Bakugo in power, all screamed a deeper interest that none of the boys in their class had ever had a clue about.

“Sometimes these seemingly strange couples end up working out just fine, don’t they?” she asked.

He nodded. “That’s true. Even my parents are getting along again, and they are as strange as couples can get.”

His remark surprised her. He had never spoken about his parents to her, and something about his tone seemed _fond,_ something she knew that he didn’t bear towards his father for most of his life.

“Do you know why my father married my mother, Yaoyorozu?” he asked suddenly, and Momo felt her eyes widen.

“From the way you asked… I suppose it was not out of love, initially?” she surmised with trepidation, unsure what to say. Their conversation had certainly taken an odd turn, and for as long as she had known Todoroki, a topic such as this was definitely uncharted territory.

He shook his head, his eyes narrowing as his mismatched irises pierced through her. She watched the lines of his face deepen, and she was helpless to do anything other than meet his intense stare with her own confused gaze.

His lips parted as he took a deep breath, and she watched as a momentary flicker of something unreadable entered his eyes before he spoke.

“Quirk marriage.”

She gasped, stunned, while the answer also made everything make _so much sense._ The long-rumored aloofness of Endeavor towards his family, Todoroki’s clear dislike of his father over most of the time she had known him… the way their family had been mostly broken up for many, many years…

“I’m sorry, Todoroki-san,” she whispered on impulse, before slapping a hand across her lips, a dark flush of mortification crawling up her cheeks and heating up her ears.

Why, oh why did she have to say that?! Surely that was impolite? How could she apologize over his parents coming together?

“Why are you sorry?” he asked, and she felt the heat in her cheeks intensify as she scrambled for something to say.

“I… I… I don’t know,” she stuttered helplessly, waving her hands in consternation. “I’m not sorry that they got together, but I am sorry for how it happened. Such marriages are… quite uncommon and not the most ideal, unfortunately-”

“Do you truly find a quirk marriage so distasteful?” Todoroki asked, a sincerely curious frown furrowing his brows. “It is strategic, isn’t it? It will bring potentially powerful children and is a strong, practical partnership.”

“I suppose they are not _terrible,”_ she tried to backtrack, averting her gaze. “It depends on the circumstances and some do prefer to marry for reasons other than romance-”

“Yaoyorozu,” he interrupted, and Momo looked up at the sharp tone of his voice.

“Y-yes?” she asked.

He sighed then, placing his hands on the table, one on top of the other. Momo followed his silent cue to calm down, and she placed her hands on her lap as she waited for him to speak.

He cleared his throat, looking away from her, eyes lost in thought as he stared out the nearby open window.

“I am not in this city by chance, Yaoyorozu,” he finally said. “I travelled here specifically to speak with you.”

She gasped. She had wondered what reason there may be for him to be in the area, and now realized that his being in the next town to stop the robbery must have been because he had been on his way to her own city.

He took a soft, deep breath before continuing, “There is also a reason why I brought my parents’ marriage up with you now. Because I came here with a… proposal, for you.”

She felt her hands shake as her mind ran through all the possible reasons why he would seek her out and bring up the topic of quirk marriage, and while the most obvious possibility screamed out in her head, she still tried to rationalize any other answer.

Surely… surely Todoroki _wouldn’t…_

“I am here because I am interested in forming such an alliance with you,” he said, and Momo felt her heart stop, blood draining from her face.

“Todoroki-san,” she whispered in disbelief, feeling her lips quiver as she gaped at him.

“I am here,” Todoroki said, staring unflinchingly back at her, “to ask you to marry me.”

A thousand different emotions flooded her chest, making her hand rise up to attempt to still her now madly beating heart. She couldn’t speak, but her mouth fell open in shock as she tried to sort out how she was truly feeling. Her mind was a mess, her usually brilliant mind failing to come up with a single logical thought, and the only thing Momo knew was that what Todoroki asked her now was something that shook her to her very bones, to the point that she knew she would have fallen over if she had not been already seated.

How could… how could he ask this of her?

“You… you are asking me… to agree to a quirk marriage? With you?” she finally choked out.

“You are not in a relationship with anyone, am I correct?”

“N-no,” she stuttered. She had never been in a relationship, at all!

“Then it is a reasonable proposition, isn’t it?” he asked.

Her head felt heavy, and her entire body trembled in disbelief as she hissed, “This is… extremely irregular, Todoroki-san.”

Momo knew that her strengths as a hero laid in her ability to think clearly under pressure. However, right then, her mind was an absolute blank. All she could understand was that while she was sad for reasons she dared not think about, a part of her was eagerly going through everything that she remembered about Todoroki, and this insane part of her was telling her that this was something that she cannot let pass.

“We cannot just marry each other out of the blue! What would people say?” she said as she laid her palms flat onto the table, leaning slightly onto them while she grappled for reasons why this was a bad idea.

For inasmuch as the idea of being asked to marry for such a reason should be despicable to her, Momo knew that marrying Todoroki was something that she had, in her deepest and most secret moments, wondered about. It was something that had crossed her mind many times while she was a teen, during those vulnerable moments when she was innocently wondering what it would be like to fall in love. Being with Todoroki as his wife was something that she had considered, when she had dared fantasize about a future with a family of her own… when she had in her silly ways idly wondered if she would someday have someone to love her like in those stupid romance manga that Mina had been so fond of sharing with her.

“Us being together,” he started speaking, seemingly oblivious to the torment that was burning her alive, “would not be wholly unexpected. Think about it; We are among the highest-ranking heroes in the country. Classmates at UA, both recommended students. We both place highly in the polls for eligible hero bachelors and bachelorettes. Not to mention the fact that we also belong to the same social class.”

So they were both rich, smart and aesthetically attractive… what exactly was he getting at?

“What are you trying to say Todoroki-san?” she asked, bracing herself for his answer as he straightened, levelling her with a distinctly no-nonsense look.

“I am trying to say that objectively-speaking, we are the perfect match, Yaoyorozu,” he said, eyes focused and determined, _sure._ “If you think about it logically, us ending up together would seem extremely predictable.”

_“Extremely predictable…”_ her thoughts echoed, the words churning uncomfortably in her head.

As always, he was right. Logically, them being married seemed less a surprise and more like a natural progression for two people who had been so in tune and similar in _so many ways_. Yet, Momo rebelled, because of all the ways she could have possibly imagined herself getting married – especially to _Todoroki_ – she had never once dreamed that it would be out of something so… _cold_ and dispassionate.

“But… quirk marriage…” she whispered. She sat back, hands clenching into loose fists.

“If you are merely concerned about the media and what our common acquaintances would say,” he said, “I am perfectly open to letting them believe that we had been in a romantic relationship prior to getting married.”

She dropped her eyes to her lap, unable to take any more of Shouto’s stare. It was unnerving, how unmoved he seemed about this proposition, and she was torn between wanting to slap him for _daring_ to come to her with this suggestion or just taking his hand and agreeing.

But… that was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Momo didn’t want a marriage founded on lies! What she wanted…

What she wanted was to someday fall in love. To have a man whom she could count on to be there for her when she was at her weakest, to hold her close at night and let her know that his heart belonged to her as much as hers belonged to him.

Yet, when she thought of who she could see herself being with…

Todoroki-san had always been on her mind, hadn’t he?

“What do you say, Yaoyoruzu?” he asked again, his voice infuriatingly steady.

She looked back up, resolutely meeting his gaze. Her heart was lodged in her throat and her hands shook with the weight of her decision, but right then, she knew that she had already made up her mind.

Todoroki’s stare grew heavier, and he leaned forward slightly, voice lowering as he asked, “Will you marry me?”

A deep breath…

A heavy, shuddering sigh…

She opened her mouth, lips shaking slightly as she muttered a single word:

“Yes.”

The word was out before Momo could talk herself out of it, and her eyes widened in disbelief, stunned by the fact that she had actually _agreed_.

At the back of her mind, she understood why she had said yes. However, her heart beat erratically in confusion, in agony, and she could only raise a hand to clutch painfully at her chest as she tried to convince herself that she was making the right decision.

He was right. Logically, they were perfect for each other. Besides, it was not as if she had anyone else lined up as a suitor or potential lover.

Yet, she could clearly see her fantasies of love and tender care with a man who cherished her dissipating into dust. She knew that, in a marriage arrangement such as this, she would never have the chance to experience the true exhilaration of blossoming love, and it hurt to think that the secret dreams she had harbored of having such sweet moments with Todoroki would never, ever come true.

This realization cemented itself when, in response to her answer, all he did was nod, before he reached into one of the hidden pockets of his hero costume. With absolutely no preamble, no sense of thrill or nervousness, he pulled out a small black velvet box, and placidly set it down on the table before her.

She reached out a single, unsteady hand, and she felt the beginning of tears prickle at the sides of her eyes as the tips of her fingers brushed against the box. She steeled herself against the rioting emotions in her chest as she grasped the box, lifting it quickly and opening it to peer inside.

A simple gold band with a single, rather large diamond sat nestled into the delicate little box. It was typical; _extremely_ _predictable_ , exactly the way Todoroki clearly thought about how they would be, together. There was nothing special or different about the ring. It was exactly what an engagement ring was supposed to look like.

“I believe you have made the right decision, Yaoyorozu,” he said. “I really do think that this marriage would be very fruitful, and frankly, I’m glad you agreed.”

She stared silently into the box as he began to stand up, listening half-heartedly as he kept speaking.

“I want this marriage to be in effect as soon as possible,” he said. “I can have a judge draw up our marriage license within the next week. My agency will speak to yours about transferring you to Endeavor, as I think it would be easier if we were to work within the same agency. I also already have a house that we could live in after the wedding.”

He had everything planned out. He even had a ring ready… Like he had already been sure that she wouldn’t disagree.

Perhaps, _she_ was entirely too predictable, as well.

“I shall be in contact with you soon so we could sort out the paperwork and everything else that we would need,” he said nonchalantly, turning away from her and heading for the door.

As if what she had agreed to was really just like any other business arrangement.

As if their now upcoming marriage was nothing more than any other simple partnership.

And in truth… that was all it really was, wasn’t it?

“See you, Yaoyorozu,” he dismissed, not even sparing her a backward glance.

He felt so distant… robotic. It seemed that everything had panned out exactly as he had foreseen, and now Todoroki was just taking all these events in as if they were things that he had already rehearsed.

She couldn’t take it. It couldn’t be like _this_.

Her lips shook as she struggled to speak, to say anything…

“Momo,” she whispered.

He stopped, looking over his shoulder at her. “Pardon?”

“Momo. Call me Momo,” she said a little louder as she finally looked up to meet his eyes once again. “If we are to be married, even if it isn’t for l-love… I would at least ask you to call me by my name.”

She stared at him, trying in vain to see if there was anything in his gaze that wasn’t as cold as his stance… she tried to find the warmth that he had exuded the last time she had seen him before today, the tender look in his gaze as he had stood before her, bathed in the darkness of the starry night sky.

But he simply nodded at her, his hair falling into his face as he turned away from her again, steadily walking out the door.

Unable to look at him, fearing that the mere sight of his retreating back would drive her to tears, Momo spun around, her lips curling in pain as she kept her eyes on the simple ring that sat in the box, taunting her from the palm of her hand. As the diamond glittered innocently from its velvety cushion, she was suddenly reminded of how the stars had sparkled differently the previous night.

She really hadn’t been ready, after all.

8-8-8-8-8

_To be continued..._

8-8-8-8-8

[Art](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1/status/1276106447538073600?s=20) by [Zinmarie1](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Momo enters married life with Shouto, she begins to feel like things between them are not as cut and dried as she had feared. She discovers many new sides to him, and she finds that this quirk marriage probably won't be so bad, after all.  
> Yet, just as she begins to really settle in, a strange new force comes in to threaten Momo's newfound haven all over again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! Here is part 2 of mine and Zinmarie1's collab for the Todomomo Mini Bang!  
> As always, the art by Zinmarie is flawless and I am so happy that we will finally get to share it with you; I've been squealing about it for DAYS!  
> Thanks again to everyone who has been working hard on organizing this event! Also, super grateful to my beta Bitchytimemachine for enduring my messy first drafts full of typos and terrible grammar, lol!  
> Let's get on with the chapter! I hope you like it, and please do drop me a line to let me know what you think!

It had been four days since Todoroki’s surprise visit to Momo’s agency, and for the first three days, absolutely nothing had happened. No calls, no messages, no further visits… It was almost as if she had just dreamt the whole thing, if not for the large solitaire diamond ring that now sat conspicuously out of place in a corner of one of her office drawers.

However, the fourth morning greeted her with nothing less than a furiously scandalized call from her best friend, Kaminari Kyouka.

“Momo, what the hell?” Kyouka almost screamed into her ear the moment she answered the phone.

Momo blearily blinked her eyes, shaking the fog of sleep from her mind as she stared in confusion at the phone in her hand.

“Kyouka, what?” she asked, trying and failing to suppress a yawn as she glanced at the time on her screen. “It’s four in the morning-”

“Don’t you ‘ _Kyouka what’_ me, Creati!” Kyouka snarled out Momo’s hero name as if it was full of venom that was leaking into her tongue. “Tell me this shit that’s all over the internet right now isn’t true.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about-”

“Are you really engaged to Todoroki Shouto?!” Kyouka asked, her voice suddenly deathly quiet.

Momo gasped, a hand going up to clutch her throat as pure _panic_ went through her mind. She had meant to tell Kyouka, but had not had the chance… how on earth did she find out?

“Kyouka-chan,” she said slowly, softly, bracing herself for the hearing hero’s indignant fury. “Where did you hear that from?”

“From the Kami-damned news and from _every single hero_ I ran into during patrol tonight!” Kyouka screeched, her voice getting louder and more frantic with each syllable. “So it’s true then?!”

“Kyouka-”

“Momo, what the hell?!” Kyouka exclaimed. “You never even told me you were _dating_! And now you’re engaged?! How could you?!”

“Ah, Kyouka-chan, I can explain-”

“And you’re moving back to Tokyo to work at the Endeavor agency?!”

Momo stiffened. She and Todoroki had discussed her transferring to his father’s hero agency, but it was absolutely just between the two of them…

Could the press leak have come from Todoroki?

“I am really pissed off at you right now, Yaomomo!” Kyouka continued to whine, not knowing that Momo could now barely breathe as she stared sightlessly into the darkness of her bedroom.

It appeared that Todoroki – the usual capable and highly independent pro-hero, Shouto – had decided to begin working on their upcoming marriage without even letting her know of it.

Was it going to be like that, then? Was their entire marriage going to be nothing but him doing what must be done, whether or not she approved, as long as she played the role of the dutiful wife?

Was their marriage going to be absolutely nothing like what Momo had always thought that such a union was going to be like?

Her parents had married out of love, and Momo saw how they had supported and built each other up through the years. Their hard work and understanding of each other paved the way to make their family's corporation more successful than ever before.

If Todoroki was going to begin working without her before they even started their lives together, then how can she ever hope for a happy and successful marriage with him?

Kyouka was still screeching in her ears, “And also! I can’t understa-”

“Kyouka-chan,” she cut her off, pasting a smile on her face in the hopes that her voice would reflect that smile, no matter how fake, and keep Kyouka from getting angrier or worried… or _suspicious_. Kyouka was smart, and was bound to think that something was fishy about this marriage if Momo were to unintentionally let anything strange slip.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Momo said, “but… Todoroki, he…”

She remembered what Todoroki had said to her; _“I am perfectly open to letting them believe that we had been in a romantic relationship prior to getting married.”_

“We had decided to keep our relationship a secret from everyone,” Momo lied through her teeth, silently begging Kyouka to forgive her. “But this week, we decided to get married, so we figured that we have no choice but to let the people know. Marriage contracts are public documents, after all. I am so sorry for keeping it from you, too…”

“How long had you been dating before deciding to get hitched?”

Momo gulped. “Well… a while,” she said, hoping to avoid answering such a question. “Honestly, it all happened so fast!”

That last part had not been a lie, at least.

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me that you had been dating Todoroki!” Kyouka hissed. “You’ve only been pining over this guy since high school-”

“I have not!” Momo denied on impulse.

“Momo, seriously, this is not the time to pretend that you haven’t been crushing on him since first year.”

“I-”

“You know what, I understand. But Momo,” Kyouka paused. “At least, let me and Denki see you off when you leave Nagoya, ok? And I will _never_ forgive you if you don’t invite us to your wedding.”

Momo gulped as a large lump throbbed in her throat, thick and heavy moisture gathering at the edges of her eyes. She reassured Kyouka that they will definitely still see each other before she left for Tokyo and that she and Denki would _of course_ be invited to the wedding; all the while wondering if she would have a choice in the matter, anyway.

She turned off her phone before heading to work for her early afternoon shift, not feeling the slightest inclination to answer any of the hundreds of messages that had popped up as news spread. She had been terrified of seeing her parent’s numbers light her screen up, but as she shut down her madly vibrating phone, she realized that neither of them had sent her a single message or even attempted to call her all morning.

It was certainly odd, and Momo simply chalked it up to the fact that her parents were not really updated on social media and had possibly not even seen the news yet. Still, she would have to call them up to personally let them know that their only daughter was about to tie the knot.

She was about a block away from her agency when she saw them: the paparazzi had taken over the streets in front of her office, microphones and cameras held aloft. She was under no delusions as to who they could possibly be waiting for.

Momo quietly backed away, silently sliding into a quiet alleyway that she knew led to the back doors of the agency. It was a lot harder than her usual route, but she really wanted to avoid the media as much as possible.

She snuck into her own workplace successfully enough, heaving a sigh of relief when she finally made it inside. However, even if she had escaped the paparazzi, there was truly no way to escape her co-workers, and she could literally _feel_ all of their gazes on her as she failed to inconspicuously make her way to her office.

She sighed deeply as she saw one of the sidekicks move closer, an inquisitive air almost palpable around her as she opened her mouth to speak.

This was going to be a very long day.

8-8-8-8-8

She had just gotten past the subtle (and some not-so-subtle) interrogations from her colleagues when Momo felt a peculiar tingling start at the tip of her ear. Not even a second later, she heard a very familiar monotone voice reverberating softly through the air, and her jaw dropped as she watched none other than Todoroki waltz out of her boss’s office. He was in civilian clothing – an inconspicuous combo of a simple white shirt, thin dark coat and denim jeans – with a placid smile on his face, one that widened into a slight grin as he caught her eye and made his way over to her.

“Hello, Momo,” he said softly as he stood before her, leaning casually against her office doorway.

The small, hesitant smile on his face almost looked nervous. She knew it was probably part of an act, keeping up appearances that their relationship was something real, but that rare look nearly knocked the breath out of her. Momo pulled up a big smile, flashing white teeth and merrily squinted eyes.

“Hello, Todoroki-san,” she greeted, watching in surprise as his brows knotted together lightly. Her own smile faltered when his face fell, and with unease, she asked, “Is something wrong?”

“You should probably call me Shouto,” he answered, voice so soft that she almost didn’t understand what he had said. “We are getting married soon, after all.”

A giddy thrill rushed through her spine as she felt her smile creep back up her lips. Everyone called him Shouto – it was his hero name, after all – but to be asked to call him such, not as his hero name but as his _name,_ was something oddly precious to her. It was a privilege, and real relationship or not, she was not about to refuse.

“Ok,” she whispered, “Shouto.”

He pushed away from the door, closing it behind himself as he entered her office and approached her desk. “I have almost finished the preparations, and I had just spoken to your boss about finalizing your transfer to Endeavor-”

His words reminded her that she was actually quite irritated at him, and now even more so at the realization that he really _had_ begun working behind her back. “I didn’t realize how much preparation you had already put into our wedding.”

“Of course, we have very little time to waste,” he said. “I set the paperwork in motion the moment I left your office the other day. However, I didn’t mean to have it leak to the press.”

She bit back a frown as she realized that she had been right in her suspicions about the source of the leak, and she grimly remembered how it had ruined her morning. She pressed her lips tightly together, looking away from Todoro – no, _Shouto,_ as she mulled over his words.

“Are you upset?”

His question had her head whipping back to him in surprise. She had kept a very neutral face, had made sure that her words were carefully devoid of any of the irritation she felt, and the fact that he somehow had an inkling that she was upset about his actions had… pleased her.

“Not really upset,” she muttered, looking away again. His mismatched eyes were probing her too deeply, far more than his words ever could, and she felt a small chill make its way up her spine as he continued to watch her quietly.

“You are, aren’t you?” he asked. “I’m sorry, Yao- er, Momo. I had thought it would be better for me to attempt to finish all the technicalities so you would not need to bother yourself with them. You are to leave Nagoya in a week, after all.”

Her jaw dropped. “What?”

Shouto silently reached into his pocket, pulling out a pair of train tickets and setting them on her desk for her to see. “I have already finalized the paperwork for your transfer to Endeavor, and I have spoken to your landlord and paid off the rest of your rent so you could leave any time. I have also arranged to have movers come pick up your things to bring them to Tokyo four days from now. They are experts, you don’t have to do anything to prepare. I have booked you a hotel for that evening. We travel to Tokyo on Sunday, and we go to court to get married on Monday.”

“Shouto, it is _Tuesday!”_ she protested, speaking the first out of the many things that had begun to spiral out of control inside her head. “I’m not ready! I haven’t even told my parents-”

“They already know,” he said, too calmly. “I asked them for your hand before coming here, and then I called them to confirm our engagement the evening after you agreed.”

“You told my pare-”

“The wedding will be small, just our families with us,” he kept speaking, enumerating the things that he had already plotted out and organized _without her knowledge._ “I didn’t want too much fanfare, considering that we will be pretending to have been in a secret relationship for a while. And we are rather short on time-”

“Shouto!” she said sharply, cutting him off. “When I agreed to marry you for… for… for _that reason_ ,” she hissed, “I did not expect you to want it to happen in less than two weeks!”

“What would be the use in waiting longer?”

Momo buried her face in her hands, elbows leaning hard against her desk.

“Did you want to stay in Nagoya? I guess I could arrange for that too,” he mused, and Momo didn’t even want to _look_ at him. “I don’t have a house here for us, but I could buy one tomorrow-”

“That is not the point!” Momo almost shrieked as she looked back up, trying desperately to keep her voice down so as not to draw attention to them, even if they _were_ in her office. “You just went and did all this without telling me. I am feeling incredibly overwhelmed…”

He stood silently, staring at her face as she ranted at him. As she tried to calm herself, she watched as he tilted his head to the side, his eyes fixed on her as a frown marred his lips.

“You’re angry,” he observed, before he slouched slightly, a palm going up to rub across his face in a clear sign of his own distress. He rubbed unconsciously at the large, discolored scar across his left eye as he continued, “And you have every right to be.”

“I- I’m not -”

“I am sorry for overstepping, Momo,” he said, pulling his hand away from his face to scratch absently at his head. It was such an endearingly childlike gesture that Momo almost forgot that she was really rather miffed at him.

“I should have consulted with you first,” he continued. “I had figured that it would be easier on you if I had finished everything by myself, and I hadn’t paused to ask if you had different ways that you wanted to go about this, as well. I’m sorry.”

He looked so contrite, nervous… Momo was struck by how different Shouto was today, from the man who had coldly proposed a loveless marriage to her a few days ago.

This Shouto was… young, humble and unsure. He didn’t seem much like the calm and calculated man who had unceremoniously handed her an engagement ring, firmly announcing that he would begin preparations for their marriage.

It struck her as _odd,_ how different he seemed, and she couldn’t quite place her finger on a possible reason as to _why._

“It’s alright,” she murmured hesitantly, a confused sensation tickling through her mind.

“This is like high school all over again,” he muttered, before he looked up at her, a shy grin on his lips. “I should have asked you first. You’ve always been the best at coming up with operations, after all.”

She knew exactly what he was referencing: their joint battle against Aizawa-sensei all the way back in their first year in UA. It was a day that she would never forget, a special memory that she had always cherished, as it had reminded her that _the_ Todoroki Shouto, her formidable and exceptional classmate whom she found nearly untouchable, had _trusted_ her.

“I am not sure if I can still rearrange all of the preparations, but will you be willing to go through with my plan this time, Momo?” he asked.

He looked at her with a painfully earnest stare, a questioning sheen in his eyes that tugged powerfully at her chest. It held a certain unsure edge, and Momo found that, just like the last time he had been in her office, no matter how ridiculous his request could be, she could not find it in herself to refuse.

She nodded, a small smile slowly slipping onto her lips as she looked at him. “I will go along with this operation, Shouto.”

He released a breath that seemed heavy enough to pass as a sigh of relief, before he spoke again. “I will remember this, Momo. I won’t plan without you again. I know that our marriage would be… unconventional, but I will not let our entire lives be just me taking charge, I promise you.”

She stood up from her chair as a strong, confusing impulse seized her… she saw her left hand rise up before she knew what she was doing, and she was nearly helpless against the force as she watched her fingers move towards Shouto…

Towards her fiancée.

A single lock of his red hair had fallen into the white strands of his right, and without conscious thought, she reached forward, the tips of her fingers gently tugging the errant strands back to where they belonged.

She couldn’t be sure, but she thought that she could see a light sheen of pink flush across the tops of Shouto’s cheeks before he cleared his throat. He looked away from her face, fixing his gaze on her wayward hand.

It was as he stared pointedly at her hand that she realized what he must have found so affronting. She pulled her hand back, clutching it against her chest as Shouto looked questioningly back at her.

“You didn’t put the ring on?” he asked.

She winced slightly, feeling the rush of blood into her cheeks, and she knew that she must be as bright red as her hero costume. “No…”

“Why not?”

“I had thought it would be better to not wear it, to not bring attention to our engagement because nobody else knew about it,” she reasoned. “Well, until this morning, that is.”

She reached into the drawer where she had kept the ring, gingerly lifting the box and placing it down on her desk in front of Shouto.

Shouto picked it up, opening the box and holding it up towards her. “They know now. You can put it on.”

Momo hesitated, and she lifted her hand to take the box from him before she suddenly stopped herself.

An impulsive moment of stubbornness crossed her then, and she frowned, wrapping her arms around herself before she whispered, “No.”

His perfectly-sculpted white eyebrow quirked up as he regarded her in surprise. “What?”

Momo took a deep, unsteady breath. “No.”

“Why not?”

She steeled herself against the question in his eyes, wondering why she was even acting so childishly, but knowing that she _needed_ this. She was going to go through with his plans, but she needed a little something that she could control, as well.

“If- if you want me to wear it,” she said, meeting his gaze head on with a serious glare of her own. “Why don’t- why don’t ­ _you_ put it on me?”

She didn’t know what she expected, but the way a wide, amused smile crept onto his lips was definitely not it. His smile looked happy, delighted even, brightening his face like sunshine falling upon silent fields at daybreak.

He moved closer, going around her desk to stand before her. She very narrowly caught her breath as he lifted the golden ring from its case, the diamond glinting mischievously in the bright fluorescent lights of her office.

It was not a romantic proposal, not the kind that she saw in movies where the girl would cover her mouth in shock as the man of her dreams gazed into her eyes amidst the gentle glow of candlelight. It was not even a proposal anymore, not really; but the way Momo’s heart beat frighteningly quickly within her chest as Shouto carefully held her trembling hand in his cool grasp, and the way tears stood in the corners of her eyes as he slid the ring onto her ring finger, felt really damn close to romantic.

She stared at the engagement ring, unable to speak as Shouto ran his thumb over the gem and the backs of her fingers. His cool fingers left fire in their wake, leaving her skin tingling along the points where they had touched.

“We are getting married, Momo,” he whispered, and when she finally looked back up to meet his gaze again, she nearly let her tears fall at what she found.

His eyes held more, much more emotion than a man who wanted to marry her only for her quirk. The soft smile on his lips, the gentle slant of his eyes and the slightest hint of a flush on his cheeks did not belong to the emotionless man who had coldly told her four days ago that _they_ were _extremely predictable._

Logically, she knew that she should not dare to get her hopes up. He had never once mentioned harboring romantic feelings for her. However, her heart was leaping with joy at the sight of that special smile.

She was marrying Todoroki Shouto.

And perhaps, that besotted part of her didn’t really care about the reason behind the marriage.

In less than a week, she was going to be Shouto’s wife.

8-8-8-8-8

“Todoroki-san?”

It took Momo a moment, but when she finally realized who was being called, she looked up, her cheeks stained red in embarrassment.

“Yes, Burnin?” she asked sheepishly.

It was still all so… _new._

She had been _Todoroki Momo_ for only three weeks, and it had all happened so fast that she felt like she was spinning solo on an out-of-control roller coaster, grasping at images of the past days as they flew by too quickly for her to comprehend.

She got by easily enough when people called her by her hero name, Creati. However, getting used to being called by her new last name was still rather disorienting.

Todoroki Momo.

The thought of it still made that small thrill run up and down her spine, and she discreetly stole a glance at the two gold rings that now wrapped around her left ring finger before fixing her gaze on the hero sidekick before her.

“You have a visitor,” Burnin said, her head of bright flames illuminating the small office that Momo sat in.

It was still odd, being part of the Endeavor Hero Agency. She had been working for so long in Nagoya that the change in environment still left her disoriented. Her colleagues at her old agency had treated her just like any other hero – albeit a powerful one – but the ones at her new workplace tiptoed around her like someone just a bit short of royalty.

This strange treatment was probably due to the fact, of course, that she was the wife of the soon-to-be head of their entire agency. Shouto was being groomed to take over, and what with hero Endeavor’s rumored upcoming retirement, it was natural that the staff members would treat her as if she was their boss, too.

She was pulled out her thoughts when a familiar round face framed with thick brown hair peeked through her doorway, her bright smile and pink cheeks making Momo jump up in excitement.

“Ochako-chan!” she exclaimed, running over and grabbing the shorter girl, pulling her into a tight hug. “It’s been so long! How are you?!”

Her former UA classmate hugged her back in a bone-crushing grip that made Momo laugh.

“I’m doing great!” Ochako said “I wasn’t supposed to be out of the country that long, but that mission was more complicated than we thought! I am so bummed that I wasn’t able to make it to your wedding, so I dropped by here as soon as I landed.”

Shouto and Momo’s wedding had been very discreet. She had worn a simple white dress, while he had worn a nondescript white shirt with brown pants, slightly reminiscent of his very first hero costume. The wedding was done with almost no fanfare: just her and Shouto signing their names into the marriage registry and their marriage contract, both of their parents acting as witnesses. A government official had “officiated” their wedding, only giving them curt instructions on what to do and where to sign, and finally giving them the signal to exchange rings. 

The ring exchange had been the most emotional part of the entire solemn ceremony; at least, it was to Momo. She had looked straight at Shouto as he calmly placed her wedding ring on her, feeling the surprisingly soft touch of his hands as he quietly ran his thumb across the bands on her finger.

He did not say a word, did not even look up to meet her gaze. Yet, something in the way he held her hand tugged painfully at Momo’s heart, and she couldn’t quite understand what it was about the way he touched her that made her heartbeats stutter.

After the short ceremony, they headed to a restaurant that both their parents had reserved and closed off to use for their wedding celebration. As Shouto had promised, it was only attended by their family and very select friends. Other than Kyouka and Denki, who had somehow managed to leave Nagoya at such short notice, a few of their old classmates had been able to join them as well. Among them were Midoriya, Iida, Tsuyu, and surprisingly, Bakugo, who quietly congratulated her and told her that Ochako had been invited but couldn’t make it, as she was still abroad for a mission.

All things considered, it had been a fairly uneventful day. The only thing that had seemed strange to Momo was how studiously Todoroki Enji, her new father-in-law, avoided interacting with her as much as humanly possible.

“Momo, you look gorgeous!” Ochako gushed. “Well, you’ve always been stunning, but wow, girl! No wonder Shouto _finally_ grabbed you up!”

Something about that statement rang very small bells in Momo’s mind, but she was so excited to see Ochako that she chose not to dwell on her friend’s strange choice of words.

They sat at a small round desk in the corner of her office, one that looked exactly like the one she had in her old workplace. In an effort to make her move back to Tokyo as comfortable as possible, Shouto had gone through mad lengths to attempt to replicate everything that she had back in Nagoya: from her office to the furnishings of the home that she now shared with him.

“Thank you,” Momo said, cupping a cheek in her palm as she smiled at her old friend. “You look amazing too!”

The two girls chatted as Momo made some quick tea, catching up for the first time in a long while. Momo listened attentively to Ochako’s stories about her work as a rescue hero, while the gravity hero marveled at all the things that Momo had experienced in Nagoya.

“So, how is married life treating you?” Ochako asked, a naughty glint in her eye that certainly did not go unnoticed by Momo.

She tried her hardest to maintain a neutral façade as she met Ochako’s gaze, pasting a shy smile on her lips even though honestly… she wasn’t quite sure.

When she and Shouto had headed home after their wedding, Momo was a mess of nerves. After all, the very nature of their marriage was to merge quirks by breeding… which required them to… to…

However, she was more than a little surprised when, as he led her into their new shared home, he quietly brought her to her room. _Her_ room.

He had prepared separate rooms for them both.

She had stuttered in surprise, dumbly asking why. He had just looked at her with that soft, understanding look in his eyes that never failed to make her heart stop, and said, _“I know we’re married now, but I’m not going to pressure you into anything you’re not ready for, Momo. It’s your choice. I’m willing to wait.”_

It had also been a surprise to her, that he had opted to purchase a house that was more “modern”. She knew that he had grown up in a traditional Japanese home, with paper walls and tatami, and that he had gone so far as to redecorate his dorm room to emulate it back when they had been students. She knew that his choice to buy a home that was more similar to Momo’s own childhood home in design, was just another one of the things that he had done to make sure that she was comfortable in their new life together.

Whatever respect and affection she may have had for him before had grown over the short time they spent together. At times, it almost seemed as though she and Shouto were just roommates, sharing a home as nothing more than platonic acquaintances. Yet, there were those quiet moments between them that sometimes made the silence seem so deep and yet meaningful; shared glances over a simple dinner, small smiles while they told each other of their respective days at work.

Creati had been going on patrols most mornings, preferring to once again witness the madness of the mid-day rush of Tokyo. Shouto, on the other hand, preferred the dangerous streets of the late evenings, usually coming into the agency during the late afternoons only to quickly complete his paperwork before heading off into the night.

They would only be together at home for a few hours in the very early morning, and Momo had taken to waking up early so that she could welcome him home. He always gifted her with that beautiful small smile, and Momo would feel her heart nearly burst as she smiled back, holding out her hand and leading him to the dining room for a quick breakfast.

On the few days when they were both home together, he would knock softly on her bedroom door, a shy smile on his lips and a gentle, nervous sparkle in his eye as he quietly asked her to join him for little things…

_“Do you want to watch a movie with me?”_

…Or to try out something new…

_“There’s a new tea store downtown, do you want to check it out?”_

…Or to do any number of random things that he somehow found himself looped into…

_“Do you know how to make okonomiyaki? I think we have all the ingredients... Let’s try making some.”_

If she tried hard to read into it, she could almost say that Shouto was really trying to make their marriage as real as it could possibly get. He was never romantic or amorous – he had never even tried to hold her hand again since the day of their wedding. Yet, he had a strange way of pulling her in closer, inviting her to get to know him more, his simple little efforts almost making her forget that what she had with him ultimately wasn’t real.

But to Momo, it _felt_ real. Real enough to make her heart thump loudly in her ears whenever he was close by… real enough for her to want to reach out and hold him, to let him know that whatever farce they may have entered in as part of this whole quirk marriage affair, she wanted to stay with him, and she would for as long as he wanted her to.

Real enough for her to want to touch him in that way that lovers do…

“It has been going really well,” Momo answered, turning her face away from Ochako to hide the very real blush that was brightening her cheeks. “Shouto is a wonderful man, and I am very lucky to have him as my husband.”

“If you need some _girl-talk_ on _you-know-what,”_ Ochako whispered conspiratorially, eagerly leaning onto the table with a wink, “Call me up.”

The blush on Momo’s cheeks absolutely mottled her face as she sputtered in shock, turning scandalized eyes at her bubbly little classmate. “O-Ochako-chan!”

Ochako cackled, and Momo _swore_ that the tiny, round girl somehow _looked_ exactly like Bakugo in that moment.

“Well,” Ochako smirked, “Lemme just say that you learn a lot of cool stuff when you can try it in zero G.”

8-8-8-8-8

Momo startled awake in the middle of the night, her heart beating a punishing staccato against her ribs while she gasped for breath. Her eyes looked wildly around her room, hands clutching at the sheets that wrapped around her as she tried to reconcile reality with the blurry vestiges of the now-forgotten dream that had filled her with inexplicable terror.

When she was finally convinced that she was indeed awake, was really back in the safety of her bed, Momo reached sideways, blindly pulling her mobile phone from her bedside table to check the time.

Just a few minutes past 3am…

She recalled that she had been feeling anxious as she headed off to bed, and glancing at the date that glowed proudly on her screen, she remembered why.

On that day, she had been married to Shouto for exactly three months.

She sat up, running a palm down her face, hastily shaking her head.

Three months of living with Shouto.

Three months of being called his wife.

Three months of seeing his shy little smiles, of feeling the subtle weight of his stare.

Three months of struggling with the fact that everything he did made her fall deeper and deeper in love with him.

There really was no use denying it anymore, was there?

Momo had no place to hide from the very real feelings that she had always tried to keep at bay, buried so far beneath her walls of self-preserving denials that she had, for years, lulled herself into believing them to be nothing beyond admiration and trust.

The three-month mark felt pivotal; She now knew for sure that being married to Shouto was something that she had always wanted, and a life shared with him was something worth the pain of knowing that, even though he was _hers_ , it would never be enough.

It would not be enough, not for as long as Momo knew that her love was one-sided, and that the only thing keeping her sane in this marriage was the fact that being with Shouto made it so easy to pretend.

What made it all worse, was the fact that her undeniable physical attraction towards him had also evolved into something that was rapidly spinning out of her control, nearly to the point that a single side glance from his intense mismatched eyes would have her hands shaking in need.

Shouto was handsome; very much so. She had always thought him appealing, from the very first day of high school when she had found herself seated beside the lanky, broody teenage version of him. She had snuck glances at him quite often, glances she was fairly confident that he had never noticed, and pairing up with him for battles and other school projects was always a thrill because she would have an excuse to look him in the eye for longer periods of time.

But now… maturity had treated him well. He was _irresistible_. He had filled out, the years of weight training and constant physical exertions showing quite exquisitely in the way his thick arms flexed discretely beneath the sleeves of his clothing. His eyes, exotically unique, showed the wisdom and confidence that he had gained as he grew into a man that was more than exceptional in his chosen field as a hero.

When he would get those quiet, contemplative looks on his face, Momo found it hard to look away… and realistically, being married to him had given Momo a right to do more than just look at him. She just didn't know if she would ever find the courage to act on anything that her body wanted to pursue.

Her heart whispered that it belonged to Shouto… But an increasingly louder part of her was now curious to know what it would be like to be his in a much more physical way.

It almost irritated her, that for a marriage arranged due to the merging of quirks, he still had never even dared make a move to see if she was ready. Because Momo may have been innocent, but she knew when a man had sensual thoughts about her, and Shouto…

She had not been clueless to the heated stares that he threw her way every now and then, those that he studiously covered up with a shake of his head or with a soft, misplaced cough. She could see when his hands would begin to unconsciously wander, moving towards her shoulders when he thought she wasn’t looking, only to be harshly pulled back as he seemingly realized what he was doing. Shouto was as hot and cold as his quirk, but his scorching stares would be hard to put out, even by the full force of his formidable ice.

"Damn you, Ochako-chan," Momo muttered mutinously, fighting the painful blush that turned her whole face red as she remembered the teasing words from her friend. She just _knew_ that those teasing words had prompted more of these wayward thoughts to come to the surface.

Daydreaming about Shouto was pointless, she decided, as she mutinously kicked her blankets off. She pushed her hair back with a huff, the long loose locks flowing down her back as she took lethargic steps, heading towards the living room to watch some mind-numbing television.

Their house, though by no means small, was still only a fraction of Momo’s childhood home. She found that she didn’t mind the fact that she only had to walk a few meters to reach the living room, that the kitchen was only a few steps away so she could quickly grab a snack as she enjoyed late-night TV.

She had just sat down and reached for the remote when she heard the key in the lock turn in the living room. She didn’t even need to turn around to know that it was Shouto coming in, the very sound of his boots now so familiar to her that she could find him through the cadence of his footsteps. Yet, it struck her as odd that he would be coming in at this time, as he usually didn’t come home until almost morning.

She turned around, a smile on her lips as she prepared to greet him, but her words were cut off with a gasp as she finally laid eyes on her husband. She bolted straight up from the couch, running towards him with arms stretched out, lips twisted in worry as she took in the sight of his bruised face, a deep red line of blood marring the perfect white of the hair on the right side of his head.

“Oh, Shouto, are you alright?” she asked, knowing that the injury was likely very minor; he was sent home after all, and hero protocol called for them to be held in the hospital for any serious injuries. However, her heart nearly pounded straight out her chest as she worried her bottom lip with her teeth, and she quickly guided him towards the bathroom while she lifted the hem of her shirt to create a towel from her own flesh.

“Take a quick shower and I’ll mend your wounds for you,” she said. “I’ll wait for you in the living room.”

She rushed into the kitchen to fetch their box of medical supplies, setting them down on the living room table as she proceeded to create a healing salve. After pulling that from her arm, she sat herself back onto the couch to wait for Shouto.

He was back and dressed up in just a few minutes. She gently pulled him along to sit him beside her, quickly taking stock of his injuries. In quick, practiced movements, she began to clean his wounds with antiseptic, swiping gently at the bruised skin and patting lightly at the small wound that she found on his temple.

“What happened?” she finally asked as she stuck one last band aid on his cheek.

“An ambush,” he muttered. “The villains were not very powerful, but they took me by surprise. They are already in police custody.

She clucked her tongue in disapproval. “You should be more careful,” she whispered. “I know you’re powerful, Shouto, but even you aren’t invincible.”

“I was careless,” he admitted sheepishly, a small blush staining his cheeks as she leaned forward to inspect a small mark near his left eye, dotting it with antiseptic as well. “My mind was elsewhere, and this happened. I’m rather irritated at myself for getting injured, no matter how minor.”

“We all make mistakes,” she murmured, focused on her task.

She brushed her bangs back as she felt a bead of sweat slowly run down her forehead. It wasn’t until then that she suddenly realized that the air had started feeling a bit warmer, and she blew some air out of her lips in a misguided effort to cool herself up.

The harsh gasp that came from Shouto was unexpected.

She pulled back, worried that she had hurt him, only to find him silently watching her. His gaze was heavy, focused intently on a single point on her face, and she almost pushed out a gasp of her own when she realized that he was staring unwaveringly at her lips.

She parted her mouth in an effort to speak, yet no words came out. She was breathless from his laser-like attention, the world falling away as she too could do nothing beyond look at his flushed face.

He seemed to snap out of whatever trance he had fallen into, and he studiously pulled his eyes away from her mouth, only to meet her gaze.

Momo felt the heat rise in the room as they both sat silently looking into each other’s eyes, enraptured; neither willing to look away. She absent-mindedly dropped the gauze and antiseptic onto the table, before her hands moved back to curl onto her lap.

She waited with baited breath, not understanding what was happening. She only knew that the look Shouto was giving her was ultimately nothing new, but something that had been muted, suppressed, in the past.

In that instant, she could see the stars in his eyes once again… just like all those years ago as they bid each other goodbye at the gates of UA, the gleam in his gaze sparkled like a million suns, more brightly than the stars in the night sky.

It seemed that whatever he had hidden away, he was now laying out into the open. His face was as honest and scared as she undoubtedly felt, but his eyes were firm, glowing with steadfast determination as he seemingly won a silent battle that had been raging within his own mind.

She didn’t know who had leaned closer; she didn’t know when it even happened. But before Momo realized it, she was breathing in his scent of spring, that smell that she found so pleasantly ironic when it came to Shouto that she had gladly memorized each tiny note.

She didn’t know when he had lifted his hands; she only knew it when she felt the surprising warmth of the palm of his left hand, contrasting sharply with the coolness of his right, as they gently cupped her cheeks.

However, what she did know was what she felt as she quietly watched him move closer. Her eyes couldn’t move away from the hypnotic lure of his mismatched gaze, unable to resist taking in every fleck of pale white on the gray on his right and the intense darkness of turquoise on his left.

As he moved ever closer, his lips coming a hair’s breadth away from hers, her giddy anticipation made her hands shake, her chest almost aching from how hard her heart was beating.

His lips touched hers… once… twice… gentle little brushes that almost felt like the breeze of a calm spring morning. Yet her ears roared, a deep gasp pulling in one last frantic breath before Shouto finally closed his lips over hers.

The sensation of his mouth on hers, of his hands softly holding her face as he slowly moved his lips against hers, stole all thoughts and worries from her mind as she gave in, closing her eyes against the shockingly overwhelming sensation. Momo held back a soft whine as she lost herself in the feel of him, her hands hesitantly reaching out to clutch desperately at his forearms as he slowly moved even _closer_.

Shouto was all that she could breathe, all that she could feel. She could stay in this beautiful bubble of _them_ forever, and Momo knew that she would have had everything that she had ever wanted and needed, if only she could always feel his lips against hers.

Her eyes stayed closed as she felt him slowly pull away, not quite ready to leave the darkness lest the sight of him overwhelm her. But Momo wanted that overload, and she opened her eyes wide, staring deeply into Shouto’s heavy-lidded gaze as her mind scrambled to reconcile the reality of the last few moments with the seconds that ticked by after he had pulled away.

Shouto had kissed her…

She couldn’t find her voice, didn’t know what to say even if she _could_ make her throat work, and she nearly giggled when Shouto took a deep breath, clearing his throat.

“Momo,” he began, his voice hoarse and deep, and he blushed before clearing his throat _again_.

She felt his hands fall away from her cheeks, and she could practically see the gears turning in his head as he bashfully looked away, a look of inscrutable guilt flashing across his eyes.

She didn’t want that guilt on him. She had wanted that kiss, could almost wish that it had never ended…

It didn’t have to end though, did it?

Before she could talk herself out of her crazy thoughts, Momo lunged forward, grabbing his face in her palms, and urgently pressed her lips to his.

8-8-8-8-8

Momo found that she really enjoyed teasing Shouto.

The early morning when they had their first kiss had been the start of a subtle shift in their relationship. Momo loved kissing Shouto, and he certainly seemed to like it as well.

When they were alone, they had taken to touching each other, simple affectionate caresses that spoke much more than what either seemed able to articulate. He would wrap his arms around her, holding her to himself while she laid her head on his chest, closing her eyes as she listened to the hastened heartbeats, relished in the unconventional warmth of his skin.

Outside the private sanctuary of their home, she often found herself moving to steal a quick kiss on his cheek, loving the way he blushed to the roots of his perfectly parted hair whenever she made a successful sneak attack. Momo highly suspected that she wasn’t nearly as sneaky as he let her believe herself to be – that he always knew she was coming but didn’t really _want_ to stop her – even if they were in semi-public.

They were on patrol on a late afternoon, and she giggled merrily as she watched his face redden after she planted another one on him while he wasn’t looking. It was rare for them to be together on patrol, but Momo had a feeling that Shouto had purposely arranged for them to be together on that day, as it was the eve of their fourth month of marriage.

They had plans for that evening, and Momo felt her cheeks heat up as she thought about the fact that Shouto had once again managed to find a way to surprise her: he had gotten them reservations for a trendy new restaurant downtown. The rest of the evening after dinner, however, was entirely up to her.

Momo had an idea of what she wanted to do. She just needed to summon the courage for it.

Perhaps, it was time for them to be truly husband and wife.

So distracted was she by the embarrassing thoughts flying through her mind that she almost didn’t notice the sudden blast of light that whizzed close enough past her to scratch a thin line of blood along her bare arm.

“Creati!” Shouto shouted, grabbing her around the waist and flinging her behind him so fast that she could only gasp as she took in the suddenly tense surroundings.

A group of four people slowly emerged from the shadows of surrounding buildings, each wearing dark body suits that covered them from head to toe.

“Villains,” Momo snarled, placing a hand across her abdomen to begin creating a weapon as she assessed their enemies.

“Who are you, and how much pain do you want to be in today?” Shouto growled as he held both hands aloft, ice and fire erupting from his palms.

Momo quickly pressed down on the emergency communications link installed into one of her utility belts, sending a signal for back up as a fifth villain slowly walked up to the center of the street.

He was a rather nondescript-looking fellow with slicked back blond hair that eerily reminded Momo of Monoma from class 3-B. However, he had truly sinister red eyes, and he wore a ridiculous tunic that resembled those old statues of characters in Greek Mythology.

“My beautiful Creati,” he called, “We meet in the flesh at last!”

Momo straightened, her hands balling into fists as his disconcerting eyes assessed her from head to foot. She shuddered in disgust as his gaze left her feeling almost dirty, and she was just about to shoot back with words of her own when she heard Shouto speak.

“Don’t you dare talk to Creati,” Shouto hissed, and even from her place behind him, she could feel a shockingly deep fury pouring out of him as he addressed the latest villain.

“My, my, Shouto-kun!” the villain laughed, placing his hands on his hips as he continued to leer at Momo. “You seem oddly stressed! I suppose you know who I am, then?”

“I do,” Shouto hissed, “Villain Cupid.”

Momo didn’t know how Shouto knew this villain, but she was puzzled again by his palpable rage that seemed rather disproportionate to what the villain had done so far. Had they fought before?

She placed her hands on Shouto’s right arm, a futile attempt to calm him as he glared fiery daggers at the man who simply grinned excitedly.

“Now, why do you look so worried, Shouto-kun?” he asked softly, a malicious, spiteful edge to his tone. “Are you afraid that your wife isn’t as incorruptible as she should be?”

“I have nothing but faith in Momo,” Shouto snapped.

She looked confusedly at his face, watching as his lips twisted in utter disdain while he kept his eyes on the villain.

“Shouto?” she asked, grabbing his sleeve, her fingers wringing into the material as her mind spun in confusion. She was missing something, but _what?_

The villain took a step closer, and in that moment, Shouto raised his right arm in a protective motion, keeping Momo behind him as he trained all of his attention on the threat before them.

“Momo is _my wife,”_ he shouted, making her snap her eyes up, jaw falling slack as she stared.

“Shouto?” she called again, but it almost seemed as if he didn’t hear her as his left arm erupted in a hellfire of violent flames.

“She is my wife,” he growled again, eyes glowing with contempt. “And if you dare lay a finger on her, Cupid, only death will save you from my wrath.”

8-8-8-8-8

_To be continued…_

8-8-8-8-8

[Art](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1/status/1277380459043926022?s=20) by [Zinmarie1](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected battle leads deeply-guarded secrets to unravel before Momo, threatening to destroy her faith in Shouto. With her heart in his hands, it is up to a tongue-tied Shouto to show Momo why their strange marriage arrangement deserves a "real" chance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again, everyone! This is the 3rd part of mine and Zinmarie1's collab for the Todomomo Mini Bang! It is a rather long chapter because I was carried away while writing it, lol! This is the last one, before a short epilogue that I will be posting on July 7.  
> The art for this chapter is *gorgeous*, and I have no words other than "thank you" towards my amazing collab partner, Zinmarie1!  
> Thanks again to everyone who is a part of this event! Also, many hugs to my beta Bitchytimemachine, who has helped me with this story so much!  
> I hope you enjoy this installment, and please do let me know what you think!

The sight of Shouto’s roaring flames as they licked greedily towards the sky, and the gleam of the long titanium staff that Momo wrenched out of her abdomen, quickly caught the attention of the civilians walking around the busy street. At the sight of the two pro-heroes about to engage a team of villains, the people began running, seeking cover away from the clearly impending battle.

The streets had barely been deserted as Shouto lunged, his right arm extending backwards to form a tall, impenetrable wall of ice that blocked Momo away from him and the villain he had called Cupid. She drew back in shock, jaw falling open as she stared in disbelief.

Did he just… shield her away from the villain?!

She would have stomped her feet in belligerent annoyance if it weren’t for the fact that two of the black-clad villains had somehow already managed to run past the barrier. Momo jumped back, staff held at the ready while she dragged a thick metal shield out of her thigh.

She engaged the two villains, mind wandering momentarily towards Shouto as she heard the sounds of his furious struggle behind the sky-high ice wall. She swung her staff towards one of the villains while she raised her shield against the other, watching them both for signs of quirk usage as she mentally prepared for any other attacks that they could launch.

A loud explosion resounded in the sky, and Momo didn’t even need to look up to know that their backup had arrived.

“Bakugo,” she called as the said hero fell from the sky to land a few feet behind her, his arms already loaded up with crackling energy as he smirked at the sight of their opponents.

“Tch,” he spat, “Will you assholes _ever_ use my actual hero name?”

She grinned as she watched him throw out his signature AP shot at one of their enemies.

“You called backup for _this_ pathetic shit show?” Bakugo growled.

“I wasn’t sure if any more were coming. Last I saw, Shouto was against three of them – two like these,” she gestured at the villains in front of them, “and one who appeared to be the leader.”

“Uravity is already over there with Icy-Hot,” he growled as he set off a quick series of explosions towards the villains.

“Something isn’t right, Bakugo,” she said. “Shouto was agitated…”

Bakugo snarled as he launched himself at the villains, and the sight of the human bomb barreling towards them finally made them use their quirks in defense. One of them shot out a large jet of high-pressured water, as the other slammed his hands against the ground, throwing up a thick wall of glass that partly shielded them from Bakugo’s attack.

“I don’t know exactly what’s happening,” Momo continued, “but Shouto called the villain Cupid.”

The name made Bakugo’s head whip rapidly towards Momo, his eyes flashing with something unreadable for a moment before he quickly blinked it away. However, she had _caught_ that strange look, and Momo was smart enough to quickly deduce that this Cupid was someone they knew of, and was clearly trouble.

“Shit,” Bakugo muttered to himself, but it was loud enough for Momo to hear.

“You know him?” Momo asked as she concentrated on creating another weapon, feeling her lipids begin to rumble as they morphed into metal within her body.

“We’ve gotta get ya outta here, Ponytail,” Bakugo said instead of answering, right as Momo pulled her trademark cannon out through her abdomen.

The large metal weapon stretched across her torso, snagging slightly on the wide gaps of her hero costume as she grunted in effort. “I am a _hero,_ Bakugo. I am here to fight.”

“Not against this jackass, ya ain’t!” Bakugo yelled. “Half-n’-Half is gonna _kill_ me if he gets his hands on you!”

Momo fired her cannon at the villains’ glass wall as she watched Bakugo reach up to speak into the communicator built into the side of his gauntlet.

“Uravity,” he called. “You and Icy-Hot take care of shit here. I’m taking Ponytail back to Endeavor.”

“Hurry,” Uravity answered, her tone clipped.

Momo’s eyes widened in disbelief. What was going _on?_ “Bakugo-“

“Not now!” he snarled, reaching out to grab her wrist with one hand while the other aimed a focused explosion on the villains.

Momo pulled away, glaring at Bakugo as he yelled at her in irritation.

“I’m not leaving!” she declared. “Who exactly is this villain?”

A loud crash from behind them made Momo turn just in time to see the tips of Shouto’s ice wall crumbling. She could hear the panicked shouts of both Uravity and Shouto from the other side of the wall as a figure in white dove down, hands stretched out towards her as he fell downwards.

The villains she and Bakugo had been engaging chose that exact moment to rush at Bakugo, a powerful jet of water launching him several feet away from her. Momo raised her shield, ready to push Cupid away as he landed almost on top of her, his hands making a mad grab for her.

She remembered Bakugo’s words about not getting Cupid’s hands on her, and briefly had a terrifying flash of memory back to their first year in UA, when their class had been engaged in a fight against the Nomu Shigaraki: He could disintegrate the very earth, and if this new villain’s powers were anything like that, she supposed she could understand what the panic was about.

She heard Shouto yell as the entire wall of ice crumbled as he rushed towards them, could hear the desperation in his voice as he called out:

“Momo! Don’t let him _touch_ you!”

She pushed Cupid back, but the villain with the water quirk had somehow gotten away from Bakugo, just long enough to blast a pressurized line of water towards her.

“Ah!” she exclaimed as the water pushed her out of balance… right into Cupid’s waiting hands.

“MOMO!” she heard Shouto yell, and she closed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable damage that the touch of the blond villain’s hand would cause her.

She felt his fingers wrap around her wrist, heard his euphoric yell of triumph, and Momo looked up when she realized…

She was fine.

Nothing… absolutely _nothing_ happened.

“What the…” Cupid muttered, his eyes wide with confusion as Momo stared almost dumbly right back at him.

She quickly regained her wits, hurriedly pulling her iron shield up and smashing it against him with a grunt.

He stumbled back, a stunned look on his face, and Momo watched as Shouto came upon him with a loud cry of utter wrath, an enormous fountain of fire shrouding his face in a reddish glow.

“Momo!” Shouto called again, turning to face her. His eyes were wild with panic, lips twisted in horror as he quickly raked his gaze over her to check if she was injured.

“I’m fine,” she said. “He grabbed my arm, but nothing happened.”

A look of incredible relief washed across Shouto’s face, before he turned back around to face the villain.

“Incorruptible,” Cupid was muttering, and Momo realized that he was staring at her once again. “She is truly incorruptible. I never thought-”

He did not get to finish that statement as Shouto charged with an angry cry, encasing himself and the villain within a dome of solid ice.

“Bakugo! Creati!” Momo heard the call coming from somewhere high above her, and she looked up to find Uravity floating in mid-air and looking just a little disheveled, proudly holding up two unconscious villains.

Uravity threw the villains down onto the street, before charging over to Momo. A touch of her hand sent Momo flying up to the sky, and Momo let out a shrill little scream as she felt herself being carried away by the negated forces of gravity.

“Bakugo, I’ll take Creati!” Uravity called out to the Explosion Hero, who simply nodded as he kept his eyes trained on the remaining enemies.

Momo felt her stomach lurch as she was propelled forward, the lack of weight leaving her completely helpless against the force of Uravity’s surprisingly strong grip. She barely realized it when they finally touched down onto the ground, and Momo planted her feet as solidly as possible as she fought against the dizzying sensation of Ochako’s quirk.

“You ok, Momo?” Ochako asked as she helped Momo walk into Endeavor Agency with a soft, four-fingered grip on her elbow.

Momo nodded as they kept walking, barely noticing the commotion around the agency as Ochako quickly maneuvered her way into the agency’s small clinic. Momo let herself follow Ochako’s soft directions as her friend sat her down and began putting some antiseptic on the small wound on her forearm.

She wondered momentarily how Ochako knew the building layout so well, before she quickly remembered that Bakugo had used to work at Endeavor and had quite possibly brought Ochako with him at times.

When they finally emerged from the clinic, Momo stifled a yawn and allowed her mind to wander as they meandered around the office. Wordlessly, they walked by the rows and desks of interns and staff as Momo considered the etiquette of speaking with her old classmate and inviting Ochako to her office.

It was as such idle thoughts went through Momo’s head that she took notice of a middle-aged couple standing at the entrance to the hallway that led to Endeavor's office. They wore clearly expensive clothing, and the woman was holding on to the man’s arm as they began to make their way into the hall.

The strangest thing about the whole thing was that Momo knew _exactly_ who those two people were.

“Mother? Father?” she called as she jogged up to meet them, surprised to see them at the agency.

Both spun around, and Momo paused in her strides when she noticed the thinly veiled alarm in their eyes as their gazes met.

“What are you both doing here?” Momo asked as her mother moved forward to give her a hug.

The elder Yaoyorozu woman was a near exact replica of her daughter, except with dark brown hair. Momo’s thick black locks were from her father, who stood a foot away, a troubled look on his face as he assessed her from head to toe.

“Are you alright?” her father asked.

Momo was about to nod when her mother suddenly blurted out, “Did Cupid touch you?!”

Her mother’s question stunned her, and Momo gaped in confusion as she realized that her parents knew about this villain, too. It reminded Momo of how Shouto and Bakugo had both absolutely done everything they could to keep the villain from touching her, and loud pangs of paranoia sprung into Momo’s mind as she finally understood that something big was going on here, something that _everyone but her_ were privy to.

“Alright, what exactly is going on?” Momo demanded, noticing that Ochako had walked up to stand a few feet behind her. She glanced back at Ochako, only to find her trading a small look with Momo’s mother.

“Someone tell me what is happening, _right now,”_ Momo demanded. “Mother, how do you know about Cupid?”

A large shadow fell over the four of them, and Momo looked up, finding herself staring straight into the sharp turquoise eyes of Endeavor, himself. Though his eyes held the exact same color of Shouto’s left eye, Endeavor’s stare gave Momo a thick feeling of trepidation, made worse by the fact that this was possibly the very first time that she had ever locked stares with her intimidating father-in-law.

The Flame Hero easily towered over her, and he simply nodded at all of them, signaling that they follow him as he quickly turned to walk away. He led them all to his massive office, and Momo found herself ill at ease as her parents began to speak to Endeavor with surprising familiarity.

“Endeavor,” her father spoke, “we had entrusted our daughter to you, and are quite disappointed that she still had to face this _maniac,_ after all.”

Endeavor’s gaze clouded, his glare made more sinister by the moving shadows cast upon his face by the wild flames that constantly surrounded him. Momo understood the look of anger that flashed across his eyes… so similar to the look in Shouto’s while deep in the throws of his own fury.

“She's safe, isn’t she?” Endeavor answered. “Shouto had seen to it, that your daughter wouldn’t be affected by Cupid.”

“I don’t know if this is exactly what we had asked, Endeavor-san,” Mrs. Yaoyorozu said.

“My son, my _heir,_ agreed to take this mission without compensation,” Endeavor responded. “I may not have agreed with his methods, but he managed to make it work.”

“Excuse me,” Momo cut in, as she found herself utterly lost in the discussion. “What mission? This Cupid… is he a known villain here?”

“Perhaps you should explain this to your daughter, Yaoyorozu-san,” Endeavor said to Momo’s father. “After all, the final decision here had been made between you and Shouto, wasn’t it?”

Momo’s heartbeats began to pound in her ears as she realized that what had happened was much larger than she had anticipated… and apparently, her parents, Shouto, and Endeavor were all in on it. A feeling of dread crawled up her spine, the sinking feeling lodging itself in her throat and making her fingers shake. She knew with one hundred percent certainty, that whatever it may be that she was about to find out today, she was not going to like it.

“Father? Mother?” Momo asked, feeling tears begin to moisten the edges of her eyes as she sank in on herself. “What does Endeavor-san mean?”

Mr. Yaoyorozu heaved a loud sigh, before he looked Momo straight in her eyes.

“Momo,” he began. “I need you to remember that we love you, and all of our decisions here were made because we didn’t want you to be hurt.”

“Father-”

“We asked help from Endeavor several months ago,” he continued, “when we began receiving threatening letters in our manor, all addressed to you.”

“To me?” Momo asked. “I was in Nagoya…”

“The letters were from an obsessed stalker who wanted your powers under his control,” her mother said. “He claimed that he was going to take you for himself, and that all he needed was to touch you, to make you his slave forever.”

“Endeavor investigated, and they found out that the letters were being sent by an elusive villain called Cupid,” her father continued. “And he has a peculiar quirk…”

It was then that Endeavor leaned forward, meeting Momo’s eyes once again.

“Cupid’s quirk is called _Seduction,”_ Endeavor spat the word as if each syllable left a trail of slime on his tongue. “He could make any person fall obsessively in love with him with a single touch of all five fingers of one hand.”

Momo nodded in confusion, her gaze landing on Ochako as the Gravity Hero thinned her lips in clear disapproval. It was clear to Momo that Ochako knew what was going on and she didn't like it one bit.

“But it had a limitation,” Endeavor continued. “His quirk won’t affect a person who is already deeply in love with another. He calls these people ‘incorruptible’.”

Momo gasped, clearly remembering how Cupid had stared at her in shock, mumbling that exact same word, after he touched her.

His quirk didn’t work on her because she was _incorruptible_ to him.

Because she was already in love…

“When Shouto heard about the issue,” her father spoke again, “he swore that he would personally see to it that Cupid’s quirk would never affect you, or that he would make it so that Cupid wouldn’t even _try…”_

At those words, Momo felt her insides quake as a desperate wave of sorrow clawed at her heart. Her mind was already putting the pieces together, but she needed to know…

“And Shouto suggested marrying me, so that the villain would think I was incorruptible?” she asked slowly, gritting her teeth as she begged her watery eyes to not let a single drop of tear fall.

“Exactly,” her mother agreed. “He then went to Nagoya to speak to you, and then he called us to let us know when you agreed.”

“Did he tell you that when he went to see me, he asked me to marry him for _quirk marriage?”_ Momo whispered harshly as her blood rushed madly to her head, heating the tips of her ears while she fought to keep her breaths even.

The realization of Shouto’s true motivations for coming to her brought a pain sharper than any stab wound or injury that Momo had ever encountered in her life as a hero. She glared accusingly at her parents, the willing accomplices to this charade that was threatening to physically rend her heart into pieces.

Momo knew that in her months of being married to Shouto, she had regularly entertained wistful ideas that he asked her to marry him out of a deep-seated love that he, in his terrible grasp of emotions, did not quite understand. Momo wanted to believe that Shouto, in some ways, loved her even a fraction as much as she cherished him.

However, now she could clearly tell that her fantasies were nothing more than silly delusions. This marriage was nothing but a mission to Shouto, an assignment to protect the damsel in distress from the scary monster that tried to reach for her beyond the shadows.

A deep feeling of bitter betrayal swept through her like poison in her veins, darkening her every memory of the man she loved; that silent, talented man that she had always adored. She thought back on every touch, on each kiss, and the knowledge of how utterly fake each loving caress must have been filled her throat with bile, tainting what would have been her most beautiful memories with flashes of rage and unbelievable heartache.

Perhaps, all those kisses had been lies, dirty lies meant to make her fall in love with him, so that should the villain attack, she would be utterly incorruptible, and Shouto could proudly say that the mission was a success.

He had always been highly competitive, after all.

Her body shook with the force of her agony, the incomparable wave of her anger, and she tasted the insults that she wanted to spit at her parents sitting at the back of her tongue. She bit her lip, fighting to reign herself in, and that was when the massive doors to Endeavor’s office suddenly swung open.

And there Shouto stood, looking as beautiful as always, his hair swept up by the winds, his clothing immaculate in spite of being in battle just a few minutes before. The sight of him filled Momo with absolute rage, and without a word, she stood up, making her way towards him.

“Momo,” he called, jogging up to her, eyes filled with worry.

The worry in his gaze made her _seethe_ , her mind telling her that the worry was _not real,_ or at least, not for the reasons that she would want them to be.

Before Momo could realize what she was doing, she felt her right arm swing forward in a wide arc, and she didn’t even flinch as her open palm connected with his left cheek in a hard, resounding slap.

He stumbled back in shock, hand rising to his face as he stared at her in something akin to horror. A small spark of flame combusted near his left ear, casting flickering shadows on the large scar that covered his one turquoise eye. His eyes were wide as he hesitantly reached out to her…

“Momo,” he whispered.

“Don’t you dare,” she hissed, “Don’t you _dare_ , Shouto.”

Shouto looked around, a spark of alarm in his eyes as he noted exactly who was in the room with Momo.

“You…” he began, “you _know_.”

The look of guilt on his face tore at her with a painful vengeance, and Momo found herself unable to speak. She couldn’t even _think,_ as her mind had blanked at the absolute anguish that flowed within her soul. She could feel the tears fighting to leave the confines of her eyes, but she stubbornly held them back.

Without another word, she ran past him, her feet taking her someplace that even she didn’t know. All Momo knew was that she needed, _needed,_ to run.

She couldn’t bear to spend a single moment more with Shouto.

She didn’t think she could ever be strong enough to face him again.

8-8-8-8-8

Momo was usually a very intelligent person. Ruled by logic, her every step was calculated, each move a strategy meant to accomplish any goal that she puts her mind into.

A tormented, conflicted Momo was another story entirely. When she was not herself, she had a tendency to drop any and all thoughts, moving mechanically in ways that made no sense, going along with the flow of whatever situation she inevitably found herself in.

It was this confused version of Momo that somehow found herself stepping off the train platform in Nagoya, still wearing her hero costume as she silently made her way through the familiar, busy streets. She had turned her phone and communications link off, not wanting to be found... Needing to be alone, to _think_. She had money and a credit card in her utility belt, but she didn’t even remember numbly paying for the train fare. She couldn’t even recall a single moment of the entire train ride altogether.

She had ignored the odd looks she had received from fellow passengers, could not hear the calls of her hero name as she quietly, aimlessly walked towards nowhere. It was only when she finally felt her legs beginning to give way, that she paused, looking around in mild surprise as she found herself in the center of the business district.

Without any real thought, she walked silently into a hotel and booked herself a room for a couple of nights. She didn’t have an apartment in Nagoya anymore, this much she knew, but she also needed to rest. Her body and her soul were exhausted, and Momo knew that a single night’s rest wouldn’t fix her, but it sure wouldn’t hurt either.

The bed was big, but not quite as big as she was used to. The room was nice, but it was lonely, and Momo hated herself for wishing for someone to hold her as she suffered in silence, loathing her thoughts for instantly conjuring up an image of mismatched eyes and small, timid smiles.

Those smiles weren’t _hers_ ; they never had been.

Her eyes hurt from holding back her tears, and she listlessly looked around the room, trying to find something to hold her attention. Her gaze fell on the small white landline that sat beside her bed, and Momo lethargically got up, the pain in her heart making her move to reach out to the one person who could possibly help her feel _alive_ again.

She dialed a number that she had long since memorized, her emergency contact for the four years that she had lived in Nagoya. After two short rings, a familiar and long-beloved husky voice answered.

“Hello?”

Momo felt her tongue go numb as the reassuring voice reached her, and she felt the tears that she had fought to keep from falling finally begin to drip down her cheeks. A soft sob escaped her, and before long, she was crying into the phone receiver, clutching it in a desperately tight grip as she struggled to speak.

“Hello?” the voice called out, a note of alarm making it come in louder. “Hey, who is this? Are you in trouble? Do you need help?”

Momo sobbed again, before finally choking out, “K-Kyouka-chan.”

“Momo?” Kyouka’s voice still held on to that bit of panic as she realized who was on the line. “Momo, is that you?”

“Kyouka,” Momo said again, her voice raspy and pained. “Kyouka-chan-”

“What happened?” Kyouka demanded. “Where are you? Are you in Nagoya right now?”

Momo realized that Kyouka probably checked the caller ID and found that the number she was using was a local line. She could hear Denki in the background, asking what was happening.

“I’m in Nagoya,” she answered.

“ _Where_ in Nagoya, Momo?” Kyouka asked. “I am coming over right now.”

Momo gave her the name of the hotel she was staying at, as well as the room number, before weakly putting the phone back in its cradle. As she waited for her friend to arrive, Momo wallowed in her sadness, her tears flowing steadily down the sides of her face as she lay sprawled out on her bed, staring blindly at the light fixtures on the ceiling.

Less than half an hour later, a loud series of knocks resounded through the room. She carefully got up, opening the door to find Kyouka standing there with Denki, worried looks on both of their faces.

“Momo?” Kyouka called, before quickly lunging forward to wrap Momo in a tight hug.

For several minutes, Momo could do nothing but cry into her friend’s shoulder, letting herself be steered towards the bed so that they could both sit down as she cried out her bitter pain. Momo sobbed, clutching the thick material of Kyouka’s jacket as she keened wordlessly, much to the other girl’s increasing concern.

When Momo was finally able to speak, the words spilled from her lips like an unstoppable avalanche. She told Kyouka everything, from the quirk marriage proposal and the rushed wedding, to all the things that she and Shouto had shared during their short marriage, and finally, everything that had happened that day, along with all the harsh realizations that had come to her mind as she learned the real reason behind why Shouto had asked to marry her.

When Momo was done, Kyouka sat silently stroking her back, pushing back the black hair that had escaped her high ponytail and fallen into her face in her distress. Momo was shaking, and Kyouka’s eyes were deep, holding back her quiet anger as she mulled over everything that Momo had just told her.

When Momo had finally calmed down, Denki handed her a bottle of water while Kyouka looked back at her in worry.

“I’m so sorry, Yaomomo,” Kyouka said. “I wish I could have been there for you, I had no idea…”

“I kept it from you,” Momo answered. “This is my fault. I deserve to suffer.”

They were all silent for several minutes, watching the small clock on the bedside table as the hands drew closer and closer to midnight. Momo was so, so tired, her heart pumping at a painfully slow rate, but her head buzzed with jumbled thoughts as she contemplated on what her next steps should be.

The most reasonable next course of action would have to be divorce, but a part of her sneered at the idea, that stubborn bit of her that continued to hold on to hope even as the rest of her knew there was none to be found.

Denki had been uncharacteristically quiet throughout the entire exchange, and when his voice suddenly pierced their melancholy, Momo looked up with mild surprise.

“This is strange, you know,” he began. “I mean, Todoroki is a very calculating person, but he’d never do something this underhanded intentionally.”

“I kinda agree with Denki,” Kyouka whispered from her spot beside Momo. “Could there be something that we’re missing here? I am really _furious_ at him Momo, but this does seem like a really odd thing for him to do. He’s always so blunt and practical.”

“Practical,” Momo spat. “This _is_ practical, isn’t it? _Extremely predictable,”_ she added with distaste, remembering his words when he asked her to marry him. “This is exactly the kind of thing that he would do.”

“Is it, though?” Kyouka asked. “He could have just told you the truth. Let you know he wanted to protect you. He knows you well enough that he should know that you wouldn’t have given him any grief about it. Heck, you could have even _helped_ him make a plan. Something doesn’t add up.”

Pain stabbed at Momo’s forehead, and she knew that the stress of the day was finally catching up to her. She raised a hand to her head, squinting into the distance when the little beats of discomfort began to turn into a pounding migraine.

Kyouka noticed, and she lifted a hand up to pull Momo’s hair free from her ponytail, giving her head a little massage to help her circulation.

“You need some rest, Momo,” Kyouka said. “You’ve been really upset about this and I understand, but have you at least had anything to eat? You’re looking a little pale.”

“I…” Momo hesitated, knowing Kyouka was not going to be happy with her answer. “No. I haven’t eaten anything since I left Tokyo-”

“Your quirk literally metabolizes your lipids at a supernatural rate, and you haven’t eaten in _how many_ hours?!” Kyouka scolded, her brows furrowing in irritation over her narrow eyes. “Sheesh, Momo, it’s a good thing I brought some cookies along.”

Momo watched as Kyouka pulled a couple of small, black packets from her backpack, peering at the little snacks that seemed somewhat… _familiar._

“Kyouka-chan,” Momo muttered dejectedly. “What are those?”

“Oh, these?” Kyouka asked, gesturing to the small sweets with a smirk. “These are Misfortune Cookies. An intern brought these to the agency last week, after he came back from a vacation in Germany. I stole a few coz I thought they were good. They’re like the opposite of fortune cookies, they have these sarcastic bits of ‘misfortunes’ inside them. They’re in German so I need to use a translation app, but you speak a bit of the language so you’ll probably get the jokes -”

Momo sighed. They _were_ familiar.

“I know what those are, Kyouka-chan,” she said. “I got them once from… from Shouto. In one of his gift boxes.”

Kyouka’s brows rose in surprise. “Gift boxes?”

“Yes, you know,” Momo said. “The ones that he would send us and our classmates when he comes back from other countries…”

“Momo,” Denki interrupted. “Todoroki doesn’t send out gift boxes to anyone in class. Like, _at all._ ”

“That can’t be true,” Momo said. “It wasn’t a regular thing, but I usually got his gifts maybe once, twice a year?”

Denki turned to glance at Kyouka, and Momo caught the confused look that they shared between themselves before Kyouka turned back to look quizzically at her.

“That… isn’t a _thing,_ Momo,” Kyouka said. “Todoroki isn’t the kind of guy to send random gifts. Like, he never even texts. That man is barely on his Tweeter, nobody but the guys still in Tokyo hear from him at all, and they only talk to him because they work in the same city.”

“That’s impossible,” Momo argued. “Shouto has always been in touch. He even used to send me emails back then-”

“Even Iida was complaining that they barely talk anymore,” Denki mused. “Remember, Kyou? At the wedding reception? He said he was so surprised when Todoroki called to invite him that he forgot to pack extra socks.”

Momo stared, mouth open in disbelief. “But… Iida is one of Shouto’s best friends!”

“Exactly,” Kyouka agreed. “Todoroki isn’t the best at keeping in touch… now, I think maybe he was only ever communicating with _you.”_

Momo sat in stunned silence as she tried to make sense of the things her friends were telling her. Why would he have kept in touch with her, and only her, for all that time? Why would he have kept such a line of communication between them, only to suddenly show up in her life and ruin all of it due to one stupid mission?

It didn’t make any sense…

Denki was strangely pensive, silently mouthing words before quickly shaking his head in frustration. Momo knew that this meant that he was deep, very deep within his own mind, clearly debating with himself in an odd sort of inner monologue. When he pulls in a deep breath before turning to stare straight as her, Momo braces herself for whatever it was that he could want to say.

“You know, Momo,” Denki muttered, “Don’t be mad at me, ok? But… I think Todoroki did this for a good reason.”

“What?” Kyouka hissed at her husband, sounding just as offended as Momo.

“Well, maybe not a _good_ reason,” he amended. “But, I mean, there is literally no way that he would do something this careless because he wouldn’t do anything that would hurt you.”

“Why do you say that?” Momo asked. Did Denki have any idea how little sense he was making?

“He has looked out for you, hasn’t he?” Denki defended. “I just think that no matter how stupid Todoroki’s decision had been, he won’t go out of his way to do something that could make you cry.”

Momo was about to scoff and tell Denki that he had done so much more than just make her cry, but she paused as she noticed a strangely uncomfortable look on Denki’s face. He was flushed, biting agitatedly at the inside of his cheek, and she realized that there was something on his mind that he wasn’t saying.

She wanted to grill him, to ask what it was that he was keeping from her, but she was cut off when the loud melody of the Star Wars Imperial March suddenly rang through the room. Denki started, pulling his phone out of his pocket and quickly taking a glance at his display.

“Oops, sorry, I gotta take this,” he muttered, before he quickly dashed out of the room, closing the door behind him.

Momo noticed Kyouka glaring little daggers at Denki’s back as he retreated, before turning back to her.

“You need to rest, Momo,” Kyouka said. “I also gotta go coz I have night patrol in a couple of hours. Promise me you’ll take a nice, long shower and get some sleep, ok?”

Momo nodded with a sigh, her gaze drifting in the direction of the small toilet and bath in the hotel room. “I have to make some clothes for myself, I didn’t really pack anything before I left.”

“Do you want me to bring you some stuff? I think I have some shirts that could fit you.”

She shook her head. “I’m alright. I’ll just buy some clothes tomorrow morning.”

“I’ll drop by after work, ok?” Kyouka said. “Just let me know, anything you need, I’ll bring it over.”

Momo smiled, before leaning in to give a big hug to her best friend, unspeakably grateful for how she had come to comfort Momo that evening. She felt horrible for having lied to Kyouka before, and the fact that she had been so understanding made Momo feel even worse.

“I love you, Kyouka-chan,” Momo whispered. “You’re the best friend anyone could ever ask for.”

Kyouka pulled away, a large grin on her face as she gently held on to Momo’s shoulders. “I know. Denki says I’m an awesome wife, too. You all don’t deserve me.”

8-8-8-8-8

It seemed that an eternity had passed, and yet, Momo’s mind was not any clearer than it had been the night before. The only comfort that she had was the sight of her very vacant left ring finger; the slight indent left on her skin by the rings that she had worn for a few months now were the only signs of the accursed golden bands that now laid silently under her pillows, blissfully away from her view.

In the afternoon, Kyouka had dropped by to give Momo a change of clothes, because they knew each other well enough that Kyouka had foreseen how Momo would not go out and get herself clothes like she had said she would. Momo had gratefully taken the garments from her, trading in the sleeping gown she had created for herself to sleep in the night before for a lilac tank top and light grey shorts. Both were rather tight, as she was much more… voluptuous, than Kyouka, but Momo was very grateful for them anyway.

On what was her second night in Nagoya, Momo laid back on the bed, eyes staring up at the ceiling much like she had the night before. She wondered if Kyouka or Denki were going to drop by to visit her again, but she was too embarrassed to ask and didn’t want to impose. They had their hero work, their own lives, and they shouldn’t have to disrupt their routines just because she couldn’t get her own affairs in order.

The soft knocks that echoed through her room surprised her. She quickly sat up in bed, shaking her dark hair into a loose semblance of order before she got up to answer the door.

A strange fissure of nervous energy was crawling up and down her spine, but she didn’t really understand the slight feelings of dread until she turned the knob and pulled the door to her hotel room open.

She had barely even opened the door, when an unmistakable flash of turquoise and red greeted her vision. A mere second passed, but it felt like an eternity of heartaches and lies had fallen upon her to bury her alive, as her wide eyes took in the vision of the one man that she _couldn’t_ face right at that very moment.

A deep, pained gasp jumped out of her chest before she hurriedly slammed the door shut, an enraged cry peeling from her lips as she pressed down into the lock. She couldn’t bear to look into those impassive eyes, couldn’t possibly imagine hearing those treacherous lips speak her name… not while she still burned with the humiliation of facing the fact that her love for him was truly unrequited.

“Momo!” she heard him call out. The sound of that voice felt like needles stabbing into her eardrums, and she closed her eyes, clasping her hands over her ears.

“No!” she cried, already feeling the tears begin to prick at her eyes.

She wasn’t even surprised that he had found her, not really; he certainly had the connections and ways to easily track her down. Yet, the shock of seeing him while she was still wallowing deeply in her own personal pit of hell was _excruciating_. She was not ready to be near him, not ready to see him. She didn’t _want_ to be ready.

She leaned her back against the door in the vain hopes that the mere weight of her body would be enough to keep him from coming in. “Go away!”

“Momo, please-”

“Whatever it is that you have to say, I don’t want to hear it!” she yelled. “I don’t care!”

“Please, let me explain-”

“No!” She cried again, pinching her eyes shut and willing her heart to slow down as its furious beats pounded into her head. “I don’t-”

A sob stubbornly escaped her desperate hold, cutting her words off. “I don’t want to see you. I never want to see you again.”

“Momo-”

“ _No_ , Shouto, _no!”_ she screeched, her hands moving to clutch her chest as the pain in her heart seemed to turn physical, robbing her of her breath.

How dare he follow her! How _dare_ he ask to speak to her again!

There was a long stretch of silence, and all she could do was whimper bitterly while she leaned against the door. She could feel him, standing silently just a few inches away, and she hated the fact that a large part of her still yearned to let him in, to speak to him, to forgive…

She heard him sigh, before she heard a soft thump against the wood at her back.

“Momo, I’m begging you…” he said, his voice no more than a timid whisper.

Shouto’s voice had always held an emotionless edge that made him seem aloof, untouchable, to everyone else. She had memorized the cadence of his words throughout the time they had spent together, had learned to delve into the plain tones, and knew that reading Shouto was difficult because he seemed to be so static in his speech.

However, there was a small quiver, a slight break in his voice right then that surprised her enough to make her look up. She turned around to fix her gaze onto the closed door, her tears stalling as something within her danced to an oddly hopeful melody

“I know that what I did was wrong,” he pleaded. His voice was soft, shaking in a way that she had never heard before, and his tone spoke more to her than any words ever could.

But… she was hurt, and she stayed silent even as he spoke again, that strangely melancholy tune weaving through his every syllable.

“I was stupid. But I never… I never wanted to hurt you.”

She could barely breathe; she didn’t want to listen. She wanted him to _go away._ And yet, her ears strained, desperately trying to listen to his murmured words.

“I only wanted to keep you safe, Momo,” he muttered, his voice so close that she could almost feel his whisper in her ears. “Please… _please_ let me in.”

She didn’t even realize that she had turned the lock, until she had the door widely open.

Shouto was unmoving at the threshold, looking nondescript in a simple blue shirt and denim jeans. There was something strange about the way he stood, and Momo tried to understand what it was that looked _wrong_ somehow.

It took her a little too long to realize what bothered her in the way he appeared before her, and her eyes widened when she noticed the way he had his hands hanging listlessly at his sides. His eyes looked dark and dull, and he had about him a weary look that made him hunch over and seem smaller than he really was. His hair, usually immaculately parted down the middle, was disheveled, tousled carelessly by the restless fingers that twitched against the sides of his jeans before he began to lift his hand.

Momo backed away, thinking that Shouto was about to reach for her. However, he simply wrapped his fingers around the door lock, using it to pull the door closed as he entered her hotel room.

She turned away from him as the sight of his face, the haunted look in his eyes, all felt like hands coming up to crush her heart into a punishing death grip. She walked towards the bed, sitting at the edge, keeping her eyes averted while he stood in the middle of the room, his somber gaze burning holes into the sides of her head.

Shouto had never been a man of many words, but it seemed like in this case, his tongue had failed him absolutely. She could see him parting his lips with a hesitant sigh, as if ready to begin, but as the minutes ticked by and no words came out, Momo just found herself getting increasingly anxious.

Merciful as always, she decided to put him out of his misery by breaking the metaphorical ice, and possibly the very literal one that had begun to frost the tip of his ear.

“How… how could you do this to me?” she whispered, staring blankly at her hands, twisting her ring finger that felt strangely hollow without Shouto’s rings. “You led me on. I trusted you, Shouto. I had hoped-”

She cut herself off, unsure if she should let him hear her thoughts – if he even _deserved_ to. But the brokenhearted part of her wanted him to know of her grief, and her words began to spill as carelessly as the tears that she had _not_ allowed to fall, but had begun to roll down her cheeks nevertheless.

“I had hoped… that even though you didn’t -” she sucked in a deep breath, “- _love_ me, that we could make this work. I thought you believed in me. I thought you _respected_ me, _at least-”_

“I do,” he cut her off, his voice silently slicing through her agonized thoughts. “I respect you. I believe in you. This… this all happened because I didn’t believe in _me.”_

She turned to look his way, feeling her brows lower over her eyes. Their eyes met, hers confused and hurt, his laser sharp with a willful determination that she didn’t, but wanted to understand. She raised a hand, hesitantly brushing her tears back from her cheeks. “What do you mean?”

“When your parents asked for our help to protect you from this stalker,” he began, “I told them that all they needed to do to protect you was to let you know about him. That you’re a hero… that the Creati I know is tough, and you can handle it, yourself.”

She narrowed her eyes at him as he hesitated, his eyes darting away from her for a moment before meeting her gaze again.

“But they were nervous, and when we found out about Cupid’s quirk, they were terrified that he would get to you and make you fall into his trap,” he said. “And I realized that with his kind of power, a single wrong move… a single mistake could rip you from everything that you had worked hard for over all these years. And I _panicked_.”

He took a deep breath, lifting his left hand and staring sightlessly at his own palm. The action simply brought Momo’s attention to the golden wedding ring that he wore, the one whose partner was hidden away from her as she couldn’t bear the weight of it on her shaking hands.

It seemed that his gaze was caught by the shiny bit of jewelry too, because his gaze softened even while his eyes regained a little bit of the sparkle that it had lost… as if the tiny, shiny trinket, the symbol of their marriage, had given him the will he needed to continue. Momo watched as he clenched his fist, letting it drop to his side as he spoke again.

“I knew you could handle yourself,” he repeated. “But I wanted him to stop chasing you because I knew that you were unattached, and if he touched you, you would be his. I didn’t want to risk you forgetting everything you stood for just because of a hypnotic quirk.”

He gritted his teeth, his hands now shaking from how tightly he had balled his fists up.

“I didn’t want to risk you falling in love with him,” he whispered.

As soft as his words had been, Momo heard him, and a tiny, barely-there hiccup pulsed through her chest as her eyes widened in surprise. She dared not hope, but the way he looked so desperate still made her wishes flare back to life in her heart.

“Why not?” she asked, her throat tight with nerves as she stared at him, silently willing him to _look at her._

When his gaze lifted to meet hers again, she nearly gasped at the intensity of his mismatched stare. Her heart swelled at the way his silver eye watched her gently, soothing her like the freshly fallen snow on a gentle winter evening. At the same time, she felt a shiver run through her as his turquoise eye speared her with a focused intensity that spoke of the fire in his soul, the fire that fueled the destructive power of half of his quirk.

“Because,” he said slowly, softly. “I couldn’t risk losing you to another man before I even had a chance to tell you that I-”

“That you what?” she pushed, trying and failing to make her heartbeats slow down. They thumped mercilessly through her, and she willed them to calm down, lest she miss the words that escaped his lips so faintly. She needed to hear his every word…

“That… that I-” he muttered. “That I wanted you for _myself_.”

His words felt like the fire and ice that he wielded had seared her from head to toe, a strangely euphoric heat that made her burn while a calming cool swept through her body. She gasped loudly in utter disbelief, in indescribable joy, but she needed to hear more, needed to be sure that he _meant_ what she _needed_ him to say.

“You…” she stuttered, shoulders raised as hope began to blossom in her heart. “You _want_ me?”

He stared deep into her eyes, his entire being focused and determined, sure. However, she noticed the quiver on his lips, the way he swayed slightly on his feet as he pushed on.

“I… I’m in love with you, Momo,” he whispered, pained. “I have loved you since high school.”

“Shouto…”

“I had always wanted to tell you,” he said, “but I couldn’t.”

“Oh, Shouto,” she whispered. “How-”

“The night of our graduation,” he cut her off softly, as if he was in a hurry to tell her, as if he wouldn’t have the power to speak if he didn’t say everything _now._ “I had finally summoned up the guts to tell you.”

He paused then, a haunted look flashing through his face, and he laughed a soft, humorless chuckle before he continued.

“But then, I looked at you,” he said mournfully, “standing there with the brightest smile I had ever seen, and I knew I couldn’t… I just couldn’t…”

“Why not?” she asked.

“ _Please, Shouto, why not?_ ” she thought silently. “ _If you had only told me back then Shouto. If you had only let me know…_ ”

Her fingers dropped down to her bed, gathering fistfuls of sheets as she found herself needing to hold on to something to anchor her. The very real sensation that she would float away washed through her as Shouto, the man that she had loved for so, so long, confessed feelings that she had never thought he would have towards her. Momo’s heart both came alive and broke gently as she mulled over how different things would have been for so long, if she had only _known…_

“Because I couldn’t bear the risk of dragging you down with me when I was so damaged, and you were so… so…” he paused, “When you were just everything that I didn’t deserve to have.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, genuinely confused.

For wasn’t it her, who always ran to catch up to his slow, steady strides? Wasn’t it he, who had always seemed so perfect, so untouchable, that she had hidden her heart away, knowing that he was forever out of her reach?

“Everything about me was _wrong,_ ” he hissed, the self-flagellating regret clear in the way his voice shook. “My family was so dysfunctional that we could be in those stupid reality shows that Uraraka likes so much. I was just a hero course graduate with nothing to my name and everything left to prove. And you were already _perfect_.”

“You were going to be an amazing hero, Momo,” he went on, a small, wistful smile lifting his lips even as sadness clouded his gaze. “I couldn’t let my dumb issues be a blight on the hero that you could become. And as I watched you for all these years, I knew that never telling you how I felt was the right thing to do. Because you are _incredible,_ and the world would finally be able to see you.”

She was stunned speechless, and she let go of her death grip on the sheets to raise her trembling hands to cover her lips. She was shaking from the weight of his confession, lightheaded from how her every emotion scrambled to take the forefront in her chest.

“I wasn’t even subtle about it, apparently,” he muttered. “Kaminari knew. I let something slip that clued him in… And I suppose this is why when I called him yesterday to ask if he knew where you were, he yelled at me a bit but he told me where to find you, anyway.”

“Denki knew?” she almost shrieked. In hindsight, it explained a lot…

Denki had been strangely supportive of their marriage, had been almost apologetic about what Shouto had done. Had even outright defended Shouto, as she clearly remembered him saying, “ _He won’t go out of his way to do something that could make you cry._ ”

Shouto nodded. “Kaminari, Midoriya, Uraraka. To be honest, they were the ones who helped me understand how I felt, because this had been so confusing for me back in high school.”

At this new revelation, that single, enigmatic statement that Ochako had said in her office _finally_ made sense: _“No wonder Shouto_ finally _grabbed you up!”_

“Even Bakugo knows, now,” Shouto added. “I think he figured it out when I asked him for help with Cupid. I needed someone powerful that I trusted to fight with me, in case something went wrong.”

“If you hadn’t wanted to tell me,” she asked, before they veered off the topic in that way that a pensive Shouto sometimes tended to do. She dropped her hands to her chest as she asked, “What changed now?”

“I was finally getting my life on track,” he explained. “My family is starting to fix our issues… my father and mother are living together again. I’m taking over the Endeavor Agency in a year or so. I had reached the top ten in hero rankings. I was finally beginning to not be such a problematic person. And I thought that maybe… maybe this time, I wouldn’t be a burden to you. That I was finally good enough to not get in your way.”

He cleared his throat, and Momo felt a bit sympathetic. This was probably the most he had spoken his entire life, and that he was doing it for her… to explain his heart to _her,_ made her own swell with affection, with _pride._

“When this threat was brought to us by your parents, I knew that this was possibly my only chance to have you,” he continued. “I thought that if I treated this all like a mission, asked you to marry me like it was a simple business arrangement, that it would be easier for us both. I’d have you, and I’d also be able to protect you.”

His frown deepened. “I wrote up what I wanted to say to you in a notebook - Midoriya said it made it easier to remember things if I wrote them down – and I memorized and practiced everything that I wanted to say to you the night before coming to you.”

That explained that feeling she had when he proposed the quirk marriage… The feeling that he was so cold and robotic. She imagined him literally rehearsing what he wanted to say to her, and in spite of herself… she giggled.

Shouto’s lips quirked up at the sight of her smile, but it wavered as he spoke again.

“Father didn’t think that it was a good idea… he knew firsthand what being in a quirk marriage was like, and he didn’t want that for me. But I assured him that it won’t be the same. Still, he felt so guilty about the plan that he can’t even look at you, afraid you would end up like my mother. And I admit, a part of me was terrified of that happening, too.”

His stare softened, a small frown furrowing his brow. “But I knew that I wanted you enough that I was going to make sure that I won’t treat you badly. I… I never wanted to make you cry, Momo.”

She hesitated, sighing as one niggling question remained in her mind. “Why go through all this?” she asked. “You could have just told me about your plan. And if you had wanted to be with me… you could have asked me out. Anything would have been better than this!”

Shouto shrugged, a hand flying to the back of his head to scratch at it in that boyish way that always melted Momo’s heart.

“I didn’t know how,” he admitted. “I thought it would come across as strange if I just went and asked you out all of a sudden. And I didn’t know how you would react to being protected because you’re a hero yourself. I didn’t want to offend you.”

“What you ended up doing was _more_ than just offensive, Shouto,” she muttered dryly.

He shrugged again. “I never said that it was a smart idea, Momo. I’m not very good at making these operations… that was always your thing.”

He took a step closer… and another. Before long, he was standing within her arms’ reach, and she craned her neck to look up into his eyes, watching a nervous shudder as it flushed his ears pink.

“Yesterday,” he said softly. “I was horrified when Cupid touched you. I was terrified that when he touched you, it would be over... You’d leave to be with him and there was nothing I could do to stop you.”

He paused, his face darkening as that small flush reached his cheeks. “Then his quirk didn’t work and I was so relieved. But at the same time, I felt… I felt like my whole world had fallen apart, anyway.”

“Huh?” Momo was confused. If he was in love with her, why did he look so devastated about Cupid’s quirk not working on her? Shouldn’t he feel relieved? _Happy,_ even?

“I hadn’t realized that you were already in love with someone else,” he murmured, his voice small and clearly heartbroken. “If… if you want to be with him… whoever he is, I won’t stop you. If you want to divorce me to be with him, I will sign divorce papers. I will not force you to stay with me, Momo.”

She stared in utter shock, finally understanding…

He thought that she hadn’t fallen victim to Cupid’s quirk because she was in love with _another man_.

Her beautiful, intelligent, _highly competent_ husband, didn’t understand that she was in love with _him._

A happy, elated bark of exasperated laughter bubbled up from her chest, and she closed her eyes, giggling madly. Her fists curled up before her chest as she fought and failed to hold in her laughter, peering at Shouto and laughing harder when she saw his utterly bewildered look.

“Shouto, you silly man,” she laughed as her giggles began to die down. She felt a wide smile stretch her cheeks as she looked at him, stared happily into his eyes. “You silly, silly man. Clueless as always… you haven’t really changed much since high school, have you?”

“I…” he frowned, baffled. “I don’t understand.”

She shook her head fondly, another soft giggle slipping from her lips. “Shouto, the reason his quirk didn’t work on me really _was_ because I was already in love. But there is no _other man_.”

She watched as comprehension dawned in his eyes, delighted in the clear relief and happiness that she felt in the way he gasped, mouth parting in anticipation of her words.

“It’s you, Shouto,” she whispered. “I… I am in love with _you_. And to tell you the truth… even if he had gone after me before you asked me to marry you, his powers still wouldn’t have worked… because I think I have been in love with you for _years_.”

“Momo,” he sighed, his legs buckling and giving way, making him fall to his knees before her. His eyes stayed glued to hers, wide and elated, his lips parting into the most gloriously beautiful smile that she had ever seen.

She reached for him, her palms avidly seeking the heat of his skin as her eyes watered in happiness. Her heart was bursting, pounding so hard that she could barely think past the single thought that now filled her every cell…

_Shouto…_

She wasn’t prepared when he suddenly lunged up, his lips capturing hers in a fiercely passionate caress that warmed her to her very core. Momo gasped, closing her eyes as she let the feel of him wash over her, her heart and mind swept away by the tide of his now undeniable _love._

She felt his large hands clasp possessively at her waist, pulling her closer as he slanted his mouth over hers, breathing her name against her lips as he squeezed her gently with his ardor. She moved to hold him to her, wrapping an arm around his back while she kept one hand on his cheek, lovingly running her thumb over his skin.

“Momo,” he called her name again as he pulled away, taking in a deep gulp of air before moving to kiss her once more.

She couldn’t let go… She needed more, and as this dawning realization flooded her, she found herself backing up, gently leading him until she laid back on the bed, the delicious weight of his body resting over hers.

She reached up, blindly feeling for the two golden rings that she had stowed under her pillow. She then moved to hold them up to him, a shy smile on her lips as she pushed them before his eyes.

“Do you… do you want to put these back on me, Shouto?” she asked softly.

He smiled, moving to rest his weight on his elbows as he reached up. One hand held the rings, while the other gently took her left hand. In slow, measured movements, Shouto slid the rings into place, a small smile on his lips as he let his fingers reverently brush over the cool metal; softly caressing the skin of her hand, like he had done during their wedding.

As she knew his heart now, Momo finally understood the gesture for what it was… a silent promise of forever, that he would cherish her for as long as he lived. And right then, she swore that she would forever do the same.

She kissed him again, a hand moving to grasp tightly at the front of his shirt while she did her best to wrap herself around him. Shouto gasped against her, even as one of his hands moved to weave tightly into the dark strands of her hair, and the other slowly, hesitantly snaked beneath the hem of her tank top to tease the smooth skin of her abdomen.

The question was clear in his gaze as he slowly pulled away, his face still close enough to hers that she could take in the lovely scent of his breaths. A nervous but longing glint sparkled brightly in his wide gaze, and as she lost herself in the mesmerizing depths of his stare, those little sparkles came to life, setting her heart ablaze with the force of the millions of stars that she could see shining out of his eyes.

Momo simply smiled, taking his face into her hands once again. The touch of her lips on his was her only answer as she closed her eyes, losing herself in him as she finally, finally let her own feelings shine through.

As the night turned to day, Momo found her heart so full that it felt like it would burst. Her emotions were overwhelming her, but all she needed was to take in the sight of Shouto’s sleeping face and his messy hair splayed across her pillow. She rested her head against his bare chest, relishing the scent of his skin, and she smiled, knowing that this was their new beginning.

With Shouto, her husband, at her side, everything was going to be more than alright.

Life was going to be _perfect_.

8-8-8-8-8

_To be concluded…_

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Art by [Zinmarie1](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1)


	4. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The stars sparkled differently that night…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! This is the final installment of this little fic! I want to once again thank everyone who had organized the Todomomo Mini Bang, it was such a fun event and I met so many new people! I look forward to more events in the future!  
> To my beta Bitchytimemachine and to my artist partner Zinmarie, you are both awesome. This was the most fun I have ever had writing a fic, and I owe much of it to you two!  
> Let's get to it then, shall we? I hope you have all enjoyed this story and that you like this short epilogue... And please do let me know what you think!

The stars sparkled differently that night.

Todoroki Momo narrowed her eyes suspiciously as she stared out the car window at the shiny balls of gas, burning billions of miles away.

She was but a speck in the universe that they occupied, but she knew that those stars were _conspiring_ against her. They _had_ to be.

It was also becoming entirely too evident that her husband, Todoroki Shouto, was in league with them.

He was smiling far too widely, when him even smiling in the first place was an anomaly in and of itself.

And was he _humming?!_

“Shouto,” she called, trailing a finger on his hand on the gear shift.

“Hmm?” he asked, that same smile lingering on his lips. A mischievous sparkle adorned his one turquoise eye that she could see while he kept his gaze straight ahead, focused on the road he was driving on.

He turned his hand over, gently twining their fingers as he kept driving. Momo looked down at their hands, her gaze caught by the shiny glint of the wedding band on his ring finger. With a grin, she turned her body slightly, so she could hold his hand in both of hers. With her left hand joining in, her smile widened as she looked at their rings glinting happily together, between them.

“Are you really not going to tell me where we’re going?” she asked, leaning back on her seat, her hair falling over her shoulders as she inclined her head.

“We’re almost there, Momo,” he answered, squeezing her hand while continuing to drive.

She would have pouted, but while she wasn’t generally a fan of surprises, Momo _was_ a fan of a cheerful Shouto. She wanted to keep this mood on him for as long as possible.

“Don’t worry, it’s a great place,” he said. “It was highly recommended by Bakugo.”

She raised a brow in surprise. “Our resident food critic approves?”

He nodded. “I told him that I need the place with the best food. It’s our first wedding anniversary, after all.”

Had it really been a year since their wedding? Momo still found it hard to believe. In a lot of ways, it seemed like time had flown by without her notice; Yet, so many things had happened that it almost felt as if a year had not been enough.

When Shouto turned into a certain small, quiet restaurant, Momo looked up in surprise, brows furrowed as Shouto began to unbuckle his seatbelt.

“Isn’t this…” she began.

“The restaurant that I was supposed to take you to, on the day that Cupid attacked us,” he answered coolly.

He didn’t even flinch at the reminder of the villain, and Momo shook her head as she realized that it was because Shouto had always felt that what happened that evening had been a _good_ thing. He had been unable to come clean to her about the truth regarding their marriage before the attack took place; so, in a strange way, that fight with Cupid had helped them come to terms with their feelings for each other and had helped them begin building a relationship that was _real._

“We never managed to come here, have we?” she chuckled as Shouto stood, walking over to the passenger side of the car to help her down. She didn’t really need help as it was a small car, but there was little that Momo loved more than Shouto being so sweet and attentive.

Momo may be a strong, independent hero in her own right, but what girl didn’t love being offered such careful attention every now and then?

Upon entering, they were quickly led into a quiet, secluded corner that Shuoto had reserved specifically. She knew that as much as he loved his hero work, he didn’t appreciate it when people came up to them when they were off duty.

The restaurant offered a lot of Momo’s favorite dishes, and she couldn’t help the delighted grin on her face as Shouto placed an order for the food that he knew she liked best. He just smiled back, peering at her over the top of the menu while rattling off instructions to the waiter. While they waited for the food to arrive, Momo looked around giddily, taking in the deceptively simple but tasteful décor. The ambiance was calming in its silence, the golden glow of the candlelight from their small table casting Shouto’s face in gentle shadows that moved mesmerizingly across his handsome features.

The food was _fantastic,_ and Momo’s smile grew wider with each bite. Her heart was light, her eyes wide with happiness as she watched her notoriously picky husband take small bites of the food that she nudged his way.

“I assume you’re enjoying yourself, then?” he asked with a light chuckle as Momo moaned appreciatively around a mouthful of potatoes.

“I wish we had come here earlier!” she beamed. “Have you tried the beef?”

He nodded. “It’s good. But… there is something else that I wanted to try, if you don’t mind?”

“What is it?” Momo asked, daintily swallowing a small bite of rice.

She looked questioningly at Shouto as he slowly stood, and she quickly noticed that his hands had begun to quiver slightly at his sides. He was nervous, she realized, and her brow furrowed in confusion when he moved to stand close to her, his mismatched eyes staring determinedly into her own.

Momo’s utensils fell from her fingers with a loud clank when Shouto suddenly dropped down before her, kneeling shakily on one knee.

“Sh-Shouto?” she asked, a hand moving up to clutch at her chest as she felt her heart begin to pound against her rib cage. She didn’t dare believe the thoughts that her overactive imagination were screaming at her, not even as she watched him reach into the pocket of his pants, pulling out a small, black velvet box.

“What… _Shouto_ -” she gasped, but he raised his free hand, asking for her to pause and let him speak.

“A little more than a year ago,” he began, “I asked you to marry me. I told you that us ending up together would seem extremely predictable…”

She felt her lips begin to tremble as his brows furrowed, his eyes burning holes into her irises as he fiercely held her gaze.

“I asked you to be my wife, but it was… It was all wrong, wasn’t it?” he asked. “So… I want to try to do this right.”

“You… Shouto…” she murmured in disbelief as she watched him open the box, lifting it up to her as his lips twisted into a wry smirk.

“Nothing about us… about _you_ , has ever been so simple or predictable, Momo,” he said. “And that is precisely what I have always loved, will _always_ love, about you.”

She stared speechlessly at the ring he held up to her, a stunning piece of jewelry that looked nothing like her current ring. Her ring was the simple and _predictable_ one that he had given her as he calmly asked for her hand in a quirk marriage a year ago. She had, for a time, disliked the way that the ring was so ordinary; to her, it had at first felt like it showed how little thought had gone into his proposal, how he had seemed to just expect her to agree, which was exactly what she had done.

She had grown to love her ring in the past year, but nothing could have prepared her for the ring that Shouto now held up to her.

This new ring was _special._ A large solitaire diamond sat in the center of a delicate gold band, flanked by tiny, brilliant red garnets. This ring was not just any other pretty ring: it was a ring that symbolized _them._

It was _them,_ in the way that the red stones reminded Momo of her hero costume. It was _them,_ in the way that the brilliant white diamond and the red garnets synched like Shouto’s ice and fire, a beautiful, contrasting combination that simply took Momo’s breath away.

“You deserve more than a rehearsed speech,” he continued, his voice heavy with emotion in a way that only she would ever hear. “You deserve a real proposal, Momo.”

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a long moment before turning his gaze back to her.

With that look, Momo broke in a glorious way, as tears of indescribable happiness poured rapidly yet silently down her cheeks. She waited with baited breath as Shouto smiled, as he took in another deep breath before asking her the question that she now _needed_ to hear.

“Will you marry me, Momo?” he whispered, his free hand reaching tremulously for hers, tightly twining their fingers. “Marry me, again?”

She nodded, unable to speak around the tears that now blurred her vision and seeped into her parted lips. She knew she would marry him as many times as he wanted… in as many ways as they possibly could.

“Yes,” she finally croaked, nodding vigorously through a peel of giddy laughter.

Shouto smiled… a sight that she would never tire of, a priceless vision that she would carry in her heart for as long as she lived.

And as he placed her new ring onto her finger, Momo smiled widely, looking deep into his sparkling eyes before she lunged forward to capture his lips in hers.

Shouto’s eyes shone brilliantly that night, more brightly than any of the mischievously twinkling stars in the night sky…

And Momo knew that she would forever cherish the light that his beloved eyes brought into her life, the enthralling glow that he shone upon her heart.

The stars sparkled differently that night… but this time, she was ready.

8-8-8-8-8

_The end._

8-8-8-8-8

**Art Showcase**

Thanks to [Zinmarie1](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1) \- a fantastic Mini Bang partner and a wonderful new friend - for the gorgeous art for this fic. <3

[Chapter 1](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1/status/1276106447538073600?s=20)

[Chapter 2](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1/status/1277380459043926022?s=20)

[Chapter 3](https://twitter.com/zinmarie1/status/1279020755234283520?s=20)


End file.
